O. R. C 
 
 
THE GOSPEL FOR 
 AN AGE OF DOUBT 
 
_^T1^^ 
 
THE GOSPEL FOR 
 AN AGE OF DOUBT 
 
 tl)e fait iltautte on ptfatljtng 
 1896 
 
 BY 
 
 HENRY VAN DYKE 
 
 D.D. (PRINCETON, HARVARD, YALE) 
 PASTOR OF THE BRICK CHURCH IN NEW YORK 
 
 Bui if any speak not concerning Jesus Christ, 
 
 I look upon them as tombstones and sepulchres 
 
 of the dead, on which are written only the 
 
 names of men." 
 
 St. Ignatius, Epist. ad Phil. 
 
 THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
 
 LONDON : MACMILLAN & CO., Ltd. 
 1897 
 
 All rights reserved 
 
Copyright, 1896, 
 By the MACMILLAN COMPANY. 
 
 Set up and electrotyped September, 1896. Reprinted December 
 1896; January, 1897. 
 
 Norfajooti iPrfSS 
 
 J. S. Gushing & Co. — Berwick & Smith 
 
 Norwood Mass. U.S.A. 
 
FOEEWORD 
 
 A FEW words may serve to make the aim 
 of this book more plain to those who read 
 it. A great part of what is written here was 
 spoken to the students of divinity at Yale 
 University in the spring of 1896, as one of 
 the courses of " Lectures on Preaching " which 
 have been given for some years on the Lyman 
 Beecher Foundation. But I must frankly con- 
 fess that a strong wish to say something which 
 might reach beyond, or, better still, through, 
 the immediate audience, and be of help to the 
 wider circle of men and women who care for 
 the vital problems of faith, drew me aside 
 from the usual line of such lectures and gave 
 this book a new purpose. 
 
 The question of how to preach is highly 
 interesting to students for the ministry. But 
 it has already been answered so fully and so 
 ably by those who have jDreceded me in this 
 course that I cannot hope to add anything 
 of value to their various counsels. And after 
 all, it is a technical question. The art of 
 
vi Foreword 
 
 preaching, important and beautiful and power- 
 ful as it may be, is only a part of the larger 
 art of life. Religion is the spiritual secret 
 of this larger art of life. The force of relig- 
 ion to move and inspire the hearts of men 
 lies not in the modes and forms of preaching, 
 but in the Gospel, — the message which it 
 brings to the human soul. The deep ques- 
 tion, the important question, the question of 
 widest interest, is what to preach to the men 
 and women of to-day, to cheer them, to up- 
 lift them, to lead them back to faith, and 
 through faith to a brave, full, iioble life. 
 This is the question for which I have tried, 
 at least, to point the way to an answer. 
 
 What is the word of spiritual life and power 
 for the jDi'esent age? Evidently it must be a 
 real gospel, a word of gladness and a word 
 of God.i j^ ^y[}} j-^Q^ (]^Q ^Q teach for doc- 
 trines the commandments of men. Tradition 
 is powerless. Dry systems of dogma cannot 
 quicken the soul. The preacher's message 
 must come to him from a heavenly source, 
 and take hold upon him with the charm of 
 a divine novelty. It must be so fresh, so 
 vivid, so original to his own heart that he 
 cannot help wanting to tell it to the world. 
 1 See Appendix, Note 1. 
 
Foreivord vii 
 
 This wonderful sense of newness in the gos- 
 pel is Avhat makes men long to preach it 
 and the world glad to hear it. 
 
 But it is no less plain that the message, in 
 a certain sense, must also be old. It cannot 
 be out of touch with the past. It must be 
 in line with the upward movement of human- 
 ity through the ages. It must be in reverent 
 harmony with the faith and hope and love 
 which have already cheered sind purified and 
 blessed the best of human lives. An alto- 
 gether new religion can hardly be an alto- 
 gether true religion. 
 
 NoAV the solution of this apparent difficulty 
 — the reconciling of the old and the new — 
 lies in a personal view of the gospel of Jesus 
 Christ. The effort to get such a view, for 
 every age and for every man, results in a thrill- 
 ing and joyful sense of new discovery of an old 
 and changeless truth. One way in which this 
 feeling of newness comes is through the neces- 
 sity of clearing away the human accretions which 
 have gathered about the gospel. Christianity 
 always has been, and probably always will be, 
 subject to obscuration and misunderstanding. 
 It has been presented as a complex system of 
 doctrine. In reality, it is a spiritual life. 
 The arguments used to defend it have often 
 
VIU 
 
 Foretvord 
 
 become hindrances to its acceptance. The 
 formulas framed to express it have often hid- 
 den Him who is its true and only centre. 
 Christ is Christianity. To find God in Him, 
 to trust and love God in Him, is to be a 
 Christian. To preach Him, in the language 
 of to-day, to the men of to-day, for the needs 
 of to-day, 1 is to preach a gospel as new and 
 as old as life itself. 
 
 This is the thing in which Christianity dif- 
 fers from all other religions. It has a Person 
 at the heart of it ; a Person who is as real as 
 we are ; a Person who carries in Himself the 
 evidence of a spiritual world ; a Person who 
 has proved in myriads of souls His power to 
 save men, not only from the evil of sin, but 
 also from the gloom of doubt. He is the only 
 steadfast Light shining through the deep, star- 
 less night of scepticism that has overspread 
 our proud and unhappy modern world. To 
 see Him is to be sure of God and immortality. 
 Such a Person could not have lived if the 
 universe were a mere product of matter and 
 force. It would be easier to think that the 
 floating clouds of sunset could beget out of 
 their vaporous bosoms a solid and eternal 
 mountain peak, than that the vain and vague 
 1 See Appendix, Note 2. 
 
Foreivord ix 
 
 dreams of spiritual life rising from a human- 
 ity born only of the dust, and fated to crumble 
 altogether into dust again, could have pro- 
 duced such a firm and glorious reality as the 
 character and life of Jesus of Nazareth. 
 This is the foundation of faith, to believe 
 that Christ is " the revelation of the true 
 meaning and the realization of the true des- 
 tination of every man ; and that in Him as 
 the personal incarnation and reproduction of 
 the personal God in our personal selves, we 
 and the whole creation shall come into our 
 divine inheritance."^ 
 
 We must get back from the confusions of 
 theology to the simplicity that is in Christ. 
 We must see clearly that our central message 
 is not the gospel of a system, but the gospel of 
 a Person. We must hold fast the true humanity 
 of Jesus in order that we may knoAv what is 
 meant by His true divinity. We must recognize 
 His supreme authority in the interpretation of 
 the Bible itself. We must accept His revela- 
 tions of human liberty and divine sovereignty. 
 Above all, we must accept His great truth of 
 election to service as our only salvation from 
 the curse of sin, which is selfishness. 
 
 1 W. P. Du Bose, S. T. D., The Soteriology of the New 
 Testament (New York, 1892), p. 171. 
 
X Foreword 
 
 If the following of this course should lead 
 us to break with some time-honoured dogmas 
 and definitions, let us only be careful to see 
 to it that our sole desire and aim is to discern 
 the truth as it is in Jesus more clearly and 
 preach it more simply. If it should lead us 
 to new modes of speech and forms of expres- 
 sion, let them grow only out of the earnest 
 effort to bring religion more closely home to 
 the real lives of men. Our age has its own 
 character, its own perils, its own needs, its 
 own hopes and aspirations. The only gospel 
 that it is worth while to preach must stand 
 in vital relation and speak with vital power 
 to the present age. 
 
 This is the line that I have tried to follow 
 in this book. I have added a full appendix 
 of notes, chiefly from recent writers, with a 
 twofold purpose. First, to make it clear by 
 the sorrowful and confused confessions of 
 modern doubt how much the age needs a 
 gospel ; and, second, to show how many men 
 of all classes are moving in the same direc- 
 tion, — towards a renewal of faith. In truth, 
 if the evils and dangers of the age are great, 
 its encouragements are even greater. The ex- 
 periment of a secular unbelief has never been 
 tried on such a large and splendid scale, with 
 
Foreword xi 
 
 such blank and desperate failure. The long- 
 ings and efforts of the world to attain a 
 higher, happier existence for all men have 
 never been more generous and ardent. With 
 the materialism, the sensuality, the pride of our 
 age, Christianity stands in confiicto With the 
 altruism, the humanity, the sympathy of our 
 age, Christianity must stand in loving and 
 wise alliance. A simpler creed and a nobler 
 life will prepare the way for a renaissance of 
 religion greater and more potent than the 
 world has known for centuries. It seems as 
 if we stood on the brightening border of the 
 new day. The watchword of its coming is 
 the personal gospel of Jesus Christ, in whom 
 we find the ideal man and the real God. 
 
 Forest Hills Lodge, Franconia, 
 July 10th, 1896. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 LECTURE 
 
 I. An Age of Doubt 
 
 II. 
 
 The Gospel of a Person 
 
 III. 
 
 The Unveiling of the Father . 
 
 IV. 
 
 The Human Life of God 
 
 y. 
 
 The Source of Authority . 
 
 YI. 
 
 Liberty 
 
 VII. 
 
 Sovereignty 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Service 
 
 Appendix 
 
 PAGE 
 
 1 
 
 41 
 81 
 123 
 167 
 203 
 245 
 281 
 
 319 
 
AN AGE OF DOUBT 
 
"Cleave ever to the sunnier side of doubt, 
 And cling to Faith beyond the forms of Faith ! 
 She reels not in the storm of warring words, 
 She brightens at the clash of ' Yes ' and ' No,' 
 She sees the Best that glimmers thro' the Worst, 
 She feels the Sun is hid but for a night, 
 She spies the summer thro' the winter bud, 
 She tastes the fruit before the blossom falls. 
 She hears the lark within the songless egg, 
 She finds the fountain where they wail'd ' Mirage ' ! '' 
 — Tennyson, The Ancient Sage. 
 
AN AGE OF DOUBT 
 
 There is one point in which all men resem- The pen 
 
 ble each other : it is that they are all different. 
 But their differences are not fixed and immuta- 
 ble. They are variable and progressive. Types 
 of character survive or perish, like the forms 
 of animal life. Some predominate ; others are 
 subordinated. 
 
 Thus it comes to pass that underneath all 
 the diversities of individual life, we may dis- 
 cern, not with the clearness of a portrait, but 
 with the vague outlines of a composite photo- 
 graph, the features of a Zeitgeist^ a spirit of 
 the time. Generations differ almost as much 
 as the men who compose them. There is a 
 personal equation in every age. 
 
 To know this is a necessity for the preacher. 
 Even as the physician must apprehend the idio- 
 syncrasy of his patient, and the teacher must 
 recognize the quality of his pupil, so must the 
 preacher be in touch with his age. 
 3 
 
 al equation 
 of the age. 
 
4 An Age of Doubt 
 
 Literature j^i endeavouring to arrive at this knowledge, 
 
 of life. contact with the world is of the first conse- 
 
 quence. For one who desires to make men and 
 women what they ought to be, nothing can 
 take the place of an acquaintance with men 
 and women as they are. It seems to me that 
 one of the best means of obtaining this ac- 
 quaintance is througli literature, — not that 
 highly specialized and more or less technical 
 variety of literature which is produced ex- 
 pressly for certain classes of readers, but liter- 
 ature in the broader sense, as it appeals to 
 cultivated and intelligent people in general, 
 including contemporary history and criticism, 
 poetry and fiction, popular philosoph}^ and di- 
 luted science. This kind of literature is the 
 efflorescence of the Zeitgeist. It is at once a 
 product^ and a cause, of the temperament of 
 the age. In it we see not only what certain 
 men have written by way of comment on the 
 movement of the times, but also what a great 
 many men are reading while they move. It 
 expresses, and it creates, a spirit, an attitude 
 of mind. " I do not imagine," says a keen 
 observer, " that I am announcing an altogether 
 novel truth in affirming that literature is one of 
 the elements of the ethical life, — the most im- 
 portant perhaps ; for in the decline, more and 
 
of yenej^al 
 reading. 
 
 An Age of Doubt ^ 
 
 more. evident, of traditional and local influences, 
 the book is taking its place as the great ini- 
 tiator." ^ 
 
 P For this reason I believe that a course in The value 
 I modern novels and poetry might well be made 
 f a part of every scheme of preparation for the 
 ministry. The preacher who does not know 
 what his people are reading does not know his 
 people. He will miss the significance of the 
 current talk of society, and even of the daily 
 comments of the newspapers, which are in fact 
 only a cheap substitute for conversation, unless 
 he has the key to it in the tone of popular 
 literature. It is from this source that I have 
 drawn many of the illustrations for this lecture. 
 If they appear unfamiliar or out of 23lace in a 
 theological seminary, I can only say that they 
 seem to me none the less, but perhaps the more, 
 significant and valuable on that account. For 
 I think that one of the causes by which, as 
 John Foster wrote seventy years ago, " Evan- 
 gelical Religion has been rendered unaccepta- 
 ble to persons of cultivated taste," ^ has been 
 a certain ill-disguised contempt on the part of 
 
 1 Paul Bourget, Essais de Fsychologie Contemporaine^ 
 Paris, 1895. See Appendix, note 3. 
 
 2 John Foster, Essays, " On the Aversion of Men of Taste 
 to Evangelical Religion," p. 188. 
 
6 An Age of Doubt 
 
 persons of orthodox opinions for what they 
 are pleased to call, "mere belles-lettres.'' And 
 though I do not fancy that there is any sym- 
 pathy with that frame of mind in this place, 
 yet the occasion seems opportune for saying 
 in a definite way that the preacher who wishes 
 to speak to this age must read many books in 
 order that he may be in a position to make the 
 best use of what Sir Walter Scott called '' the 
 one Book." He must keep himself in touch 
 with modern life by studying modern litera- 
 ture, which is one of its essential factors. 
 
 A doubting As soon as we step out of the theological cir- 
 cle into the broad field of general reading we 
 see that we are living in an age of doubt. 
 
 I do not mean to say that tliis is the only 
 feature in the physiognomy of the age. It 
 has many other aspects, from any one of whicli 
 we might pick a name. From the material 
 side, we might call it an age of progress ; 
 from the intellectual side, an age of science ; 
 from the medical side, an age of hysteria ; from 
 the political side, an age of democracy; from 
 the commercial side, an age of advertisement ; 
 from the social side, an age of publicomania. 
 
An Age of Doubt 7 
 
 But looking at it from the spiritual side, which 
 is the preacher's point of view, and considering 
 that interior life to which every proclamation 
 of a gospel must be addressed, beyond a doubt 
 it stands confessed as a doubting age. 
 
 There is a profound and wide-spread un- The ques- 
 settlement of soul in reg'ard to fundamental ^^.'"^-^ 
 
 ^ spirit. 
 
 truths of religion, and also in regard to the 
 nature and existence of the so-called spiritual 
 faculties by which alone these truths can be 
 perceived. In its popular manifestations, this 
 unsettlement takes the form of uncertainty 
 rather than of denial, of unbelief rather than 
 of disbelief, of general scepticism rather than \ 
 of specific infidelity. ^ The questioning spirit 
 is abroad, moving on the face of the waters, i 
 seeking rest and finding none. 
 
 It is not merely that particular doctrines, 
 such as the inspiration of the Bible, or the 
 future punishment of the wicked, are attacked 
 and denied. The preacher who concentrates 
 his attention at these points will fail to realize 
 the gravit}^ of the situation. It is not that a 
 spirit of bitter and mocking atheism, such as 
 Bishop Butler described at the close of the 
 last century, has led people of discernment 
 to set up religion ''as a principal subject of 
 1 See Apioendix, note 4. 
 
8 All Age of Bouht 
 
 mirth and ridicule, as it were by way of re- 
 prisal for its having so long interrupted the 
 pleasures of the world." ^ The preacher who 
 takes that view of the case now will be at 
 least fifty years too late. He will fail to 
 understand the serious and pathetic temper of 
 the age. 
 Respectful The questioning spirit of to-day is severe 
 
 unbelief. ^ , , ^ • ^ . , 
 
 but not bitter, restless but not frivolous ; it 
 takes itself very seriously and aj^plies its meth- 
 ods of criticism, of analysis, of dissolution, 
 with a sad courtesy of demeanour, to the deep- 
 est and most vital truths of religion, the being 
 of God, the reality of the soul, the possibility 
 of a future life. Everywhere it comes and 
 everywhere it asks for a reason, in the shape 
 of a positive and scientific demonstration. 
 When one is given, it asks for another, and 
 when another is given, it asks for the reason 
 of the reason. The laws of evidence, the prin- 
 ciples of judgment, the witness of history, the 
 testimony of consciousness, — all are called in 
 question. The answers which have been given 
 by religion to the most difficult and pressing 
 problems of man's inner life are declared to 
 be unsatisfactory and without foundation. The 
 
 ^ Joseph Butler, The Analogy of Beligion (London, Bell 
 & Daldy, 1858). "Advertisement," p. xxiv. 
 
An Age of Doubt 9 
 
 question remains unsolved. Is it insoluble? 
 The age stands in doubt. Its c oat-of-arms is 
 an interrog ation point rampant, abov e three 
 bishops dormant, and its motto is Querijf 
 
 n 
 
 If we inquire the cause, of this general seep- Causes of 
 
 ... , T • , 1 scepticism. 
 
 ticism m regard to religion, the common answer 
 from all sides would probably attribute it to 
 the progress of science. I do not feel satisfied 
 with this answer. At least I should wish to 
 qualify it in such a way as to give it a very 
 different meaning from that which is implied in 
 the current phrase " the conflict between science 
 and religion." 
 
 Science, in itself considered, the orderly and ' Science not 
 
 1 1 PIT 1 • hostile to 
 
 reasoned knowledge ol the phenomenal universe religion. 
 of things and events, ought not to be, and has 
 not been, hostile to religion, simply because it 
 does not, and cannot, enter into the same sphere. 
 The great advance which has been made in the 
 observation and classification of sensible facts, 
 and in the induction of so-called general laws 
 under which those facts may be arranged for pur- 
 poses of study, has not even touched the two 
 questions upon the answer to which the reality 
 and nature of religion depend : first, the pos- 
 
10 An Age of Doubt 
 
 sible existence of other facts wliicli physical 
 science cannot observe and classify ; and sec- 
 ond, the probable explanation of these facts. 
 The task of What has happened is just this. The field in 
 'changed, hut which faith has to work has been altered, and 
 enlarged. it seems to me enormously broadened. But 
 the work remains the same. The question is 
 whether faith has enough vital energy to face 
 and accomplish it. For example, the material 
 out of which to construct an argument from 
 the evidences of final cause in nature has been 
 incalculably increased by the discoveries of the 
 last fifty years in regard to natural selection 
 and the origin of species. The observant wan- 
 derer in the field of nature to-day no longer 
 stumbles upon Dr. Paley's old-fashioned, open- 
 faced, turnip-shaped watch lying on the ground. 
 He finds, instead, an intricate and self-adjusting 
 chronometer, capable not only of marking time 
 with accuracy, but also of evolving by its own 
 operation another more perfect and delicate 
 instrument, with qualities and powers which 
 adapt themselves to their surroundings and so 
 advance forever. The idea of final cause has 
 not been touched. Only the region which it 
 must illuminate has been vastly enlarged. It 
 remains to be seen whether faith can supply 
 the illuminating power. Already we have the 
 
A71 Age of Doubt 11 
 
 promise of an answer in many books, by mas- 
 ters of science and pliilosojDby, who show that 
 the theory of evolution demands for its com- 
 pletion the recognition of the spiritual nature 
 of man and the belief in an intelligent and per- 
 sonal God.i 
 
 The spread of scepticism is often attributed The expan- 
 to the growth of our conception of the physical knowledge. 
 magnitude of the universe. The bewildering 
 numbers and distances of the stars, the gigan- 
 tic masses of matter in motion, and the tremen- 
 dous sweep of the forces Avhich drive our tiny 
 earth along like a grain of dust in an orderly 
 whirlwind, are supposed to have overwhelmed 
 and stunned the power of spiritual belief in 
 man. The account seems to me incorrect and 
 unconvincing. I observe that precisely the ' 
 same argument was used by Job and Isaiah 
 and the Psalmists to lead to a conclusion of 
 faith. The striking dis23roportion between 
 the littleness of man and the greatness of the 
 stars was to them a demonstration of the ne- 
 cessity of religion to solve the equation. They 
 saw in the heavens the glory of God. And if 
 man to-day knows vastly more of the heavens, 
 does not that put him in position to receive a 
 larger and loftier vision of the glory ? 
 1 See Appendix, note 5. 
 
12 
 
 A7i Age of Doubt 
 
 Devoid men 
 of pure sci- 
 ence. 
 
 The ai^o- 
 f/ance of 
 science 
 falsely so- 
 culled. 
 
 We observe, moreover, that it is just in those 
 departments of science where the knowledge of 
 the magnitude and splendid order of the physi- 
 cal universe is most clear and exact, namely, in 
 astronomy and mathematics, that we find the 
 most illustrious men of science who have not 
 been sceptics but sincere and steadfast believ- 
 ers in the Christian religion. Kepler and I 
 Newton were men of faith. The most brill- 
 iant galaxy of mathematicians ever assembled 
 at one time and place was at the University of 
 Cambridge in the latter half of this century. 
 Of these " Sir W. Thomson, Sir George Stokes, 
 Professors Tait, Adams, Clerk-Maxwell, and 
 Cayley — not to mention a number of lesser 
 lights, such as Routh, Todhunter, Ferrers, etc. 
 — were all avowed Christians."^ Surely it 
 needs no further proof to show that the pur- 
 suit of pure science does not necessarily tend 
 to scepticism. 
 
 No, we must look more closely and distin- 
 guish more clearly in order to discover in the 
 scientific activities of the age a cause of the 
 prevailing doubt. And if we do this I think 
 we shall find it in the fallacy of that kind of 
 science which mistakes itself for omniscience. 
 
 1 George John Romanes, M.A., LL.D., F.R.S., Thoughts 
 on Beligion (Chicago, 1895)^ p. 147. 
 
An Age of Doubt 13 
 
 '' What we see is the pretence of certain sci- 
 ences to represent in themselves all human 
 knowledge. And as outside of knowledge 
 there is no longer, in the eyes of science thus 
 curtailed, any means for man to come in con- 
 tact with the realities, we see the pretence 
 advanced by some that all reality and all life 
 should be reduced to that which they have ver- 
 ified. Outside of this there are only dreams 
 and illusions. This is indeed too much. It is 
 no longer science, but scientific absolutism. "^ 
 
 " The history of the natural sciences," said 
 Du Bois-Reymond in 1877, " is the veritable 
 history of mankind." "The world," says an- 
 other, "is made of atoms and ether, and there 
 is no room for ghosts." M. Berthelot in the 
 preface to his Origines de Valchimie^ modestly 
 claims that " the world to-day is without mys- 
 teries " ; meaning thereby, I suppose, that 
 there is nothing in existence, from the crys- ' 
 tallization of a diamond to the character of a i 
 saint, which cannot be investigated and ex- 
 plained by means of a crucible, a blow-pipe, a 
 microscope, and a few other tools. 
 
 This is simply begging the question of a Animmense 
 spiritual world in the negative. It is an im- ««s«»^i^«^o'^- 
 
 1 Charles Wagner, Youth, translated from the French by 
 Ernest Redwood (New York, 1893), p. 28. 
 
14 An Age of Doubt 
 
 mense and stupefying assumption. It is a 
 claim to solve the problems of the inner life 
 by suppressing them. This claim is not in any 
 sense necessary to the existence of science, nor 
 to any degree supported by the work which 
 it has actually accomplished. But it is made 
 with a calm assurance which imposes power- 
 fully upon the popular mind ; and, being made 
 in the name of science, it carries with it an 
 appearance of authority borrowed from the 
 great service which science has rendered to 
 humanity by its discoveries in the sphere of 
 the visible. 
 Results of The result of this petitio principii in the 
 
 minds of those who accept it fully and carry 
 it out to its logical conclusion, is a definite 
 system of metaphysical negation which goes 
 under the various names of Naturalism, Posi- 
 tivism, Empiricism, and Agnosticism. Its re- 
 sult in tlie minds of those who accept it 
 partially and provisionally, but lack the abil- 
 ity or the inclination to formulate it, is the 
 development of a sceptical temper. Its result 
 in the minds of those who are unconsciously 
 affected by it, through those profound instincts 
 of sympathy and involuntary imitation which 
 influence all men, is an attitude, — more or 
 less sincere, more or less consistent and con- 
 
 thls assump 
 tion. 
 
An Age of Doubt 15 
 
 tinuous, — an attitude of doubt. The spirit 
 of the age tacitly divides all the various 
 beliefs which are held among men into two 
 classes. Those which are supported by sci- 
 entific proof must be accepted. Those which 
 are not thus supported either must be re- 
 jected, or may safely and properly be disre- 
 garded as matters of no consequence. 
 
 in 
 
 Now this general scepticism, in all its The nm^or 
 
 shades and degrees, from the most clear, self- J^^^/^/^'g" ^'^ 
 
 conscious, and aggressive, to the most vague, shadoio of 
 
 diffused, and deprecatory, is reflected in the 
 productions of current literature. Never was 
 literary art more perfect, more accomplished, 
 more versatile and successful than in the pres- 
 ent age. Never have its laws been more widely 
 understood and its fascinations more potently 
 exercised. Never has it evoked more magical 
 and charming forms to float above an abyss 
 of disenchantment and nothingness. 
 
 In tlie lay sermons and essays of Huxley 
 and Tyndall and Frederic Harrison and W. K. 
 Clifford, scepticism appears militant and trencli- 
 ant. These knights-errant of Doubting Castle 
 are brilliantly equipped as men of war ; and 
 
 doubt. 
 
16 An Age of Doubt 
 
 even when they fall foul of each other, as they 
 often do, the ground of the conflict is an accu- 
 sation of infidelity to the principles of unbelief, 
 and its object is to drive the adversary back 
 into a more complete and consistent negation. 
 
 Over the fragmentary but majestic life- 
 philosophies of Carlyle and Emerson, lying 
 in the disarray of stones hewn for a temple 
 yet unbuilt, imaginative scepticism hangs like 
 a cloud. Over Carlyle, it is the shadow of 
 a noonday tempest, full of darkness and tu- 
 mult and muttering thunder. Over Emerson, 
 it floats like a cumulus of evening vapours, 
 luminous and beautiful, alluringly transfigured 
 
 "In the golden lightning 
 
 Of the sunken sun." ^ 
 
 In the vivid and picturesque historical 
 studies of Renan and Froude, scepticism is 
 at once ironical and idealistic, destructive and 
 dogmatic. In the penetrative and intelligent 
 critiques of Scherer and Morley, it adheres 
 with proud but illogical persistence to the 
 ethical consequences of the faith with which 
 logic has broken : like a son disinherited, but 
 resolved to maintain the riglit of possession 
 by the strong arm. 
 
 1 Shelley, " Ode to a Skylark." 
 
An Age of Doubt 17 
 
 In the novels of unflinching and unbhishing Fiction 
 naturalism, — like those of Zola and Maupassant ^^^^"^y* 
 and the later works of Thomas Hardy, scejDticism 
 speaks with a harsh and menacing accent of the 
 emptiness of all life and the futility of all 
 endeavour. In the psychological romances of 
 Flaubert and Bourget and Spielhagen, George 
 Eliot and Mrs. Humphry Ward, it holds the 
 mirror up to human nature to disclose a face 
 darkened with inconsolable regret for lost 
 dreams. Far apart as Madame Bovary and 
 Cosmopolis^ Prohlematische Naturen and Middle- 
 march and Robert Elsmere may be in many of 
 their features, do they not wear the same ex- 
 pression, — the cureless melancholy of disil- 
 lusion ? 
 
 Fiction in its more superficial form, dealing 
 only with the manners and customs of the so- 
 cial drama, and relying for its interest mainly 
 upon local colour and the charm of incident 
 narrated with vivacity and grace, betrays its 
 scepticism by a serene, unconscious disregard 
 of the part which religion plays in real life.^ 
 In how many of the lighter novels of the day 
 do we find any recognition, even between the 
 lines, of the influence which the idea of God or 
 its absence, the practice of prayer or its neg- 
 1 See Appendix, note 6. 
 c 
 
18 A7i Age of Doubt 
 
 lect, actually exercise upon the character and 
 conduct of men? Take, for example, Trilhy^^ as 
 the type of a clever book carelessly written for 
 the thoughtless public of a passing moment. It 
 is incredibly credulous in regard to the dramatic 
 possibilities of hypnotism. It is pitifully in- 
 adequate in its conception of the actual poten- 
 cies of religion ; and it uses Christianity chiefly 
 as a subject for caricature in the style of the 
 illustrated newspapers, which are called comic. 
 Poetry de- Poetry has always been the most direct and 
 
 spo7idenL ij^timate utterance of the human heart. And 
 it is in poetry that we hear to-day the voice 
 of scepticism most clearly, '' making abundant 
 music around an elementary nihilism, now 
 stripped naked." ^ Listen to its sonorous chant- 
 ings as they come from France in the verse of 
 Leconte de Lisle, celebrating the sombre ritual 
 of human automata before the altar of the un- 
 known and almighty tyrant, who agitates them 
 endlessly for his own amusement. Listen to 
 its delicate and decadent lyrics, as Charles 
 Baudelaire sings his defeat in life and his 
 thirst for annihilation. 
 
 "Morne esprit, autrefois amoureux de la lutte, 
 L'Espoir dont I'eperon attisait ton ardeur 
 
 1 George Dii Maurier, Trilby (Harpers, 1895). 
 
 2 Paul Desjardiiis, Le Devoir Present (Paris, 1892), p. 65. 
 
An Age of Douht 19 
 
 Ne veut plus t'enfourcher. Coiiche toi sans pudeur, 
 Vieux cheval dont le pied a chaque obstacle butte. 
 
 Resigne-toi, moii coeiir, dors ton sommeil de brute. 
 
 VA le Temps ni'engioutit minute par minute 
 Comme la neige immense un corps pris de roideur: 
 Je contemple d'en haut le globe en sa rondeur 
 Et je n'y cherche plus I'abri d'une cahute ! 
 
 Avalanche, veux tu m'emporter dans ta chute?" ^ 
 
 Turn to England and hear its musical con- 
 fession in the cool, sad, melodious tones of 
 Matthew Arnold, no enemy of faith, but her 
 disenchanted lover. 
 
 " Forgive me, masters of the mind, 
 At whose behest I long ago 
 So much unlearned, so much resigned — 
 I come not here to be your foe; 
 I seek these anchorites not in ruth, 
 To curse and to deny your truth ; 
 
 Not as their friend, or child, I speak 
 
 But as on some far northern strand. 
 
 Thinking of his ovv^n gods, a Greek, 
 
 In pity and mournful awe might stand 
 
 Before a fallen Runic stone, — 
 
 For both were faiths, and both are gone." ^ 
 
 There is a poem by Tennyson (who never 
 broke with faith, though he felt the strain of 
 
 1 Charles Baudelaire, Flcurs du Mai (Paris, 1888), p. 205. 
 " Le gout du N^ant." 
 
 2 Matthew Arnold, Poems (New York, Macmillan, 1878), 
 p. 337. " Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse." 
 
20 
 
 An Age of Doubt 
 
 doubt), in which he describes with intense 
 dramatic sympathy the finality of scepticism 
 in the human soul. It is called "Des]3air." 
 A picture 0/ There is another poem, called "Sea Dreams," 
 doubt. ill which he gives a vision of the rising tide of 
 
 doubt as it threatens to undermine and over- 
 whelm the beliefs of the past. The woman is 
 telling her husband the dream which came to 
 her in the night as she watched by their sick 
 child. 
 
 " But round the North, a light, 
 A belt, it seem'd, of luminous vapour, lay, 
 And ever in it a low^ musical note 
 Sweird up and died ; and, as it swell'd, a ridge 
 Of breaker issued from the belt, and still 
 Grew with the growing note, and when the note 
 Had reach'd a thunderous fulness, on those cliffs 
 Broke, mixt with awful light (the same as that 
 Living within the belt) whereby she saw 
 That all those lines of cliffs were cliffs no more, 
 But huge cathedral fronts of every age, 
 Grave, florid, stern, as far as eye could see. 
 One after one : and then the great ridge drew, 
 Lessening to the lessening music, back, 
 And passed into the belt and swell'd again 
 Slowly to music : ever when it broke 
 The statues, king, or saint, or founder, fell ; 
 Then from the gaps and chasms of ruin left 
 Came men and women in dark clusters round. 
 Some crying, ' Set them up ! they shall not fall ! ' 
 And others, ' Let them lie, for they have fall'n.' 
 And still they strove and wrangled : . . . 
 . . . and ever as their shrieks 
 
An Age of Doubt 21 
 
 Kan highest up the gamut, that great wave 
 Returning, while none mark'd it, on the crowd 
 Broke, mixt with awful light, and show'd their eyes 
 Glaring, and passionate looks, and swept away 
 The men of flesh and blood, and men of stone, 
 To the waste deeps together." ^ 
 
 It was but a dream, dispelled from the mind The pity of 
 of lier to Avhom it came iii the night-watches ^^* 
 by the crying of her little child, and soon for- 
 gotten in the sweet reality of human love. 
 Only a dream, but hoAV many souls have felt 
 the vague sadness, the haunting, helpless pity 
 and fear of a like vision, looking out upon the 
 landscajDC of man's inner life, and seeing the 
 ancient landmarks slowly melted or swiftly 
 swept away, the shrines of memory shaken 
 and removed, the fair images of immortal de- 
 sire and aspiration dissolving and disappearing 
 in the onward waves, silently creeping, or surg- 
 ing with mysterious and inarticulate music out 
 of the waste deep of doubt, — 
 
 " The unplumbed, salt, estranging sea." ^ 
 
 Who can think of the sharp anguish and dull 
 grief that have fallen upon innumerable hearts 
 through the loss of their most precious faiths ; 
 
 1 Tennyson's Poetical Works (Macmillan, 1890), p. 138. 
 
 2 Matthew Arnold, "To Marguerite." Poems (Macmil- 
 lan, 1878), p. 184. 
 
22 An Age of Doubt 
 
 who can think of the gi'^j, formless, ever-mov- 
 ing, yet immovable flood of mordant gloom that 
 has covered so many once bright and fertile 
 fields of human hope and endeavour, so many 
 once secure and peaceful homes of human trust 
 and confidence, — who can think of these things, 
 even though his own standpoint be still un- 
 touched, liis own faith-dwelling founded upon 
 an untrembling rock far above the tide, witli- 
 out a sorrowful perturbation of spirit and a 
 deep, inward sense of compassionate distress 
 and dread ? We stand upon the shore, but Ave 
 stand beside the sea. And we look out upon 
 it, as Emile Littre sadly wrote,^ like the women 
 of Troy, whom the Roman poet pictured gaz- 
 ing at its mighty currents and engulfing waves : 
 
 " Pontum adspectabant Jietites.^' 
 
 IV 
 
 Sympathy It is with no careless and exaggerating hand, 
 
 lolth doubt. -J, • ' j_ix- J J • ' -4- 
 
 it IS m no unsympatlietic and condemning spirit, 
 that I have tried to draw this picture of the 
 sceptical age in which we live. Its faults, its 
 perils, are mine and yours. The preacher who 
 assumes a supercilious and damnatory attitude 
 
 1 Emile Littr^, Conservation^ Bevolution, Positivisme, 
 Memarques, p. 430. 
 
An Age of Doubt 23 
 
 towards the doubts of the present time can do 
 little to relieve, and may do much to increase 
 them. If we desire to be true ministers to a 
 doubting age, we must put ourselves in the posi- 
 tion of Maurice, who said, " I wish to confess 
 the sins of the time as my own."^ So far as 
 current scepticism has its source in evil, it flows 
 from faults of which we all partake, — the pride 
 of intellect, the haste of judgment, the prefer- 
 ence of the seen to the unseen, the impatience 
 of ignorance, the vain demand of perfection in 
 the finite comprehension of the infinite, and the 
 disloyalty of reason to conscience. 
 
 But indeed this is not the point of view from Lessons of 
 
 which Ave speak. This lecture is not an indict- ^^^^^J^^^^- 
 ^ ment. 
 
 ment. It is a diagnosis. Doubt, as we arc 
 thinking of it, is not a crime, but a malady. 
 And if we are to have any hope or power of 
 staying its progress and healing its ravages, we 
 must not only be sympathetic in our understand- 
 ing of it, but we must also look through it, 
 earnestly and patiently, to see whether there 
 are not some favourable symptoms, some signs 
 of enduring vitality, some promises of returning 
 health and strength in the spirit of the age. 
 Of these it seems to me that there are three, 
 
 1 The Life of Frederick Denison Maurice (New York, 
 Scribuers, 1884), vol. ii., p. 235. 
 
24 
 
 An Age of Doubt 
 
 Pessimism. 
 
 Cheerful 
 scepticism 
 almost ex- 
 tinct. 
 
 SO evident and so important, that we ought not 
 to overlook them. First, the acknowledged 
 discontent and pain of unbelief; second, the 
 practical recoil of some of the finest minds 
 from the void of absolute scepticism ; third, 
 the persistent desire of many doubting spirits 
 to serve mankind by love, self-sacrifice, and 
 ethical endeavour. In other words, I Avould 
 read the lesson of encouragement in the suffer- 
 ings of doubt, in the doubts of doubt, and in 
 the splendid moral inconsistencies of doubt. 
 
 Begin, then, with pain, which is not only a 
 warning of disease, but also a sign of life. The 
 pessimism which goes hand in hand with scep- 
 ticism in this nineteenth century is a cry of 
 suffering. The closely reasoned philosophies of 
 Schopenhauer and Hartmann, with their prem- 
 isses of misery and conclusions of despair, are 
 only the scientific statement of a widely diffused 
 sentiment of dissatisfaction and despondency in 
 regard to life.^ Their spread, like that of some 
 apparently new disease, is due to the fact that 
 they give a name to something from Avhich men 
 have long suffered. 
 
 It seemed at one time as if the course of 
 modern scepticism was to be free from sadness, 
 a painless malady. At the beginning of the 
 1 James Sully, Pessimism, pp. 2, 3. See Appendix, note 7. 
 
A71 Age of Doubt 25 
 
 century the tone of infidelity was jubilant and 
 triumphant. Percy Bysshe Shelley walked into 
 the inn at Montanvert and wrote his name in 
 the visitors' book, adding " democrat, philan- 
 thropist, atheist," — as if it Avere a record of 
 victory and a title of glory. This cheerful 
 type of scepticism still survives, here and there, 
 in a few men who insist that the process of dis- 
 enchantment is pleasant and joyous, and that 
 the optimism which belonged to faith may re- 
 main while the faith itself disappears. It is 
 like the smile of the famous cat, in the child's 
 story-book, which broadened and brightened 
 while the cat faded, until finally the animal was 
 gone and nothing but the grin was left. 
 
 But for the most part modern doubt shows a The sorrow 
 sad and pain-drawn face, heavy with grief and ^i . . 
 dark with apprehension. There is an illustra- 
 tion of this change in the life of George Eliot. 
 In her girlhood she passed suddenly, by an un- 
 conditional surrender, out of a warm faith in 
 Evangelical Christianity into the coldest kind 
 of rational scepticism. She writes of the dull, 
 and now forgotten, book which wrought this 
 change, Charles Hennell's Inquiry concerning 
 the Origin of Ohristianitg^ with strange and al- 
 most fantastic merriment: "Mr. Hennell ought 
 to be one of the happiest of men that he has 
 
 of losing 
 
26 A7i Age of Doubt 
 
 clone such a life's work. I am sure if I had 
 written such a book 1 should be invulnerable 
 to all the arrows of all the gods and goddesses. 
 The book is full of wit to me. It gives me that 
 exquisite kind of laughter which comes from 
 the gratification of the reasoning faculties. "^ 
 But the arrows which she despised struck 
 home, ere life was ended, to her own heart. 
 
 " I remember," writes Mr. F. W. H. Myers, 
 "how at Cambridge I walked with her once 
 in the Fellows' Garden of Trinity, on an even- 
 ing of rainy May, and she, stirred somewhat 
 beyond her wont, and taking as her text 
 the three words which have been used so 
 often as tlie inspiring trumpet-calls of men, 
 — the words God, Immortality, Duty, — pro- 
 nounced, with terrible earnestness, how in- 
 conceivable Avas the first, how unbelievable 
 was the second, and how peremptory and abso- 
 lute the third. Never, perhaps, had sterner 
 accents affirmed the sovereignty of imper- 
 sonal and unrecompensing law. I listened and 
 night fell ; her grave, majestic countenance 
 turned towards me like a Sibyl's in the gloom ; 
 it was as though she withdrew from my grasp, 
 one by one, the two scrolls of promise, and 
 
 1 George Eliot's Life, as related in her Letters (New York, 
 Harpers), vol. i., p. 119. 
 
An Age of Doubt 27 
 
 Left me the third scroll only, awful with in- 
 evitable fate." 1 
 
 An inevitable fate, seen through the gloom The sad as- 
 of falling night, — that indeed is the aspect of ^^^ ^^ 
 life which the literature of doubt displays to 
 us. A gray shadow of melancholy spreads 
 over the questioning, uncertain, disillusioned 
 age ; languid sighs of weariness breathe from 
 its salons and palaces. Bitter discontent mut- 
 ters in its workshops and tenements. "Never, 
 I believe," says Paul Desjardins, "have men 
 been more universally sad than in the present 
 time." And then he adds, with keen insight, 
 " Our misery lies in feeling that we are less 
 men than we were sixty years ago."^ Human 
 life has been unspeakably impoverished and 
 narrowed by the loss of faith. Comedy has 
 become tragic, and tragedy has grown mean 
 and sordid. 3 Men have lost the sound of a 
 Divine voice in the story of their existence 
 and learned to listen to it as 
 
 " a tale 
 Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury- 
 Signifying nothing." 
 
 1 R. H. Hutton, Modern Guides of English Thought 
 (London, Macmillan, 1887), p. 262. 
 
 2 Le Devoir Present^ pp. 17, 19. 
 
 3 See the plays of Ibsen : Ghosts, A DolVs House, TJie 
 Wild Duck, etc. 
 
The mean- 
 ness of man. 
 
 28 A71 Age of Doubt 
 
 Love itself, the great purifier and ennobler, has 
 been transformed in the subtle analysis of sex- 
 ual passion, from the sea-born Venus, pure and 
 radiant with immortal youth, to a dirt-engen- 
 dered goddess, concealing her secret ugliness 
 with illusory and artificial charms, and presid- 
 ing with malignant power over the lower cur- 
 rents of man's being, — a veritable Cloacina of 
 human life.^ 
 
 The thought of "the grandeur and misery 
 of man," as Pascal conceived it, was painful 
 but elevating. The conception of the insig- 
 nificance and misery of man as scepticism pre- 
 sents it, is painful and dispiriting. Born of 
 blind force and unconscious matter, quickened 
 by some mysterious cruelty to a consciousness 
 of his own origin and a foreboding of his inex- 
 plicable and fruitless destiny, he " drees his 
 weird," between two fathomless abysses of 
 gloom, as one who is indeed weary and heavy- 
 laden. The music with which he accompanies 
 his march towards the blank and dismal bourn, 
 rolls and clashes through the literature of every 
 land with deep and mournful discords, as if 
 man had at last invented that strange organ of 
 
 1 Bourget, Psychologie Contemporaine, pp, 5, 8. See 
 Appendix, note 8. 
 
An Age of Doubt 29 
 
 expression which a satirist has called *' the Mis- 
 er opJion.'^ '^ 
 
 '^ This philosophy," says Stendhal, comment- The nausea 
 
 of P0l*7 ^tP7) OP 
 
 ing upon the last reflections of his hero in Rouge 
 et iVbiV, " was perhaps tru^but it was of such a 
 nature as to make one long for death." And 
 then the critic from whom I have quoted these 
 words, adds his own commentary. " Do you 
 perceive, at the close of this work, the most 
 complete which the author has left, the break- 
 ing of the tragic dawn of pessimism ? It rises, 
 this dawn of blood and tears, and, like the clear- 
 ness of a new-born day, it overspreads with 
 crimson hues the loftiest spirits of our age, 
 those whose thoughts are at the summit, those 
 to whom the eyes of the men of to-morrow lift 
 themselves, — religiously. I am come in this 
 series of psychological studies to the fifth and 
 last of the personages whom I propose to ana- 
 lyze. I have examined a poet, Baudelaire ; a 
 historian, Renan ; a romancer, Flaubert ; a 
 philosopher, Taine ; I have just examined one 
 of these composite artists in whom the critic 
 and the imaginative writer are closely united ; 
 and I have found in these five Frenchmen of 
 
 1 Anton Bettelheim, article in Cosmopolis^ January, 1896. 
 See Appendix, note 9. 
 
30 An Age of Doubt 
 
 such importance, the same philosophy of dis- 
 gust with the universal nothingness."^ 
 Melancholia. If we turn to Russia, which has given us 
 some of the most brilliant and influential, 
 though undisciplinQ^, writers of modern fic- 
 tion, do we not hear, in an accent harsher 
 and more formidable, the same conclusions, 
 the same cries of nausea over the inextricable 
 confusion and vain efforts of human life? If 
 we turn to England, do Ave not see the same 
 cloud of melancholy, less threatening, less 
 angry, but no less dark, rising from the 
 chasm which doubt has made between man's 
 inner life and the world as scientific posi- 
 tivism pictures it ? How mournful is the 
 voice in which W. K. Clifford proclaims, 
 " The Great Companion is dead ! " How dark 
 with silent, passionate grief is that lonely 
 wood in which " Robert Elsmere " feels him- 
 self going blind to the dearest visions of his 
 former faith. ^ Hoav black the air in which 
 " Jude the Obscure " breathes out the last 
 throbbings of his insurgent heart in curses 
 upon his sordid and desperate fate ! ^ Let a 
 
 1 Paul Bourget, Psijchologie Contemporaine^ p. 321. 
 
 2 Mrs. Humphry Ward, Bohert Elsmere (Macmillan, 
 1888), vol. ii. , chap. xxvi. 
 
 ^ Thomas Hardy, Jude the Obscure (Harpers, 1896). 
 
An Age of Doubt 31 
 
 poet, with that sublime insight of genius 
 which endures even amid the ruins created 
 by its own destructive passion, speak the 
 Last word of doubt, — the epitaph of The 
 City of Dreadful Night. The portentous fig- 
 ure of " Melancholia " sits enthroned above her 
 vast* metropolis. 
 
 " The moving Moon and stars from east to west 
 Circle before her in the sea of air ; 
 Shadows and gleams glide round her solemn rest. 
 Her subjects often gaze up to her there : 
 The strong to drink new strength of iron endurance, 
 The weak, new terrors; all, renewed assurance 
 And confirmation of the old despair." ^ 
 
 But why despair, unless indeed because Pain gives 
 man, in his very nature and inmost essence, 
 is framed for an immortal hope ? No other hope. 
 creature is filled with disgust and anger by 
 the mere recognition of its own environment 
 and the realization of its own destiny. This 
 strange issue of a purely physical evolution 
 in a profound revolt against itself is incred- 
 ibly miraculous. Can a vast universe of atoms 
 and ether, unfolding out of darkness into dark- 
 ness, produce at some point in its progress, 
 and that point apparently the highest, a feel- 
 ing of profound disappointment with its par- 
 
 1 James Thomson, The CWj of Dreadful Night, xxi. 12. 
 
 an argu- 
 ment of 
 
32 An Age of Doubt 
 
 tially discovered processes and resentful grief 
 at its dimly foreseen end? To believe this 
 would require a monstrous credulity ! Athe- 
 ism does not touch this difficulty. Agnosti- 
 cism evades it. There are but two solutions 
 which really face the facts. One is the black, 
 unspeakable creed that the source of all things 
 is an unknown, mocking, malignant Power, 
 whose last and most cruel jest is the misery 
 of disenchanted man.^ The other is the hope- 
 ful creed that the very pain which man suffers 
 when his spiritual nature is denied, is proof 
 that it exists, and part of the discipline by 
 which a truthful, loving God would lead man 
 to Himself. Let the world judge which is 
 the more reasonable faith. But for our part, 
 while we cling to the creed of hope, let us 
 not fail to '' cleave ever to the sunnier side 
 of doubt," and see in the very shadow that 
 it casts the evidence of a light behind and 
 above it. Let us learn the meaning of that 
 noble word of St. Augustine : Tlioti hast made 
 us for Thyself^ and unquiet is our heart icntil it 
 j rests in Thee. 
 
 1 " It must have been an ill-advised God, who could fall 
 upon no better amusement than the transforming of Himself 
 into such a hungry world as this, which is utterly miserable and 
 worse than none at all." — David Friedrich Strauss, quoted 
 in The British Quarterly Bevieiv, January, 1877, p. 146. 
 
An Age of Douht 33 
 
 Yes, the inquietude of the heart which Therena 
 doubt has robbed of its faith in God, is an f!^,f ^-^ 
 
 ' faith. 
 
 evidence that scepticism is a mahT^dy, not a 
 
 normal state. The sadness of our times under 
 the pressure of positive disbelief and negative 
 uncertainty has in it the promise and potency 
 of a return to health and happiness. Already 
 we can see, if we look with clear eyes, the 
 signs of what I have dared to call ''the re- 
 action out of the heart of a doubting age 
 towards the Christianity of Christ and the 
 faith in Immortal Love."^ 
 
 Pagan poets, full of melancholy beauty and 
 vague regret for lost ideals, poets of decadence 
 and despondence, the age has born, to sing its 
 grief and gloom. But its two great singers, 
 Tennyson and Browning, strike a clearer note 
 of returning faith and hope. " They resume 
 the quest, and do not pause until they find 
 Him whom they seek."^ Pessimists like Hart- 
 mann work back unconsciously, from the vague 
 remoteness of pantheism, far in the direction, 
 at least, of a theistic view of the universe. 
 His later books — ReUgioitsijliilosophie and 
 
 1 The Poetry of Tennyson (New York, Scribners, 1889), 
 p. xiii. 
 
 2 Vida D. Scudder, The Life of the Spirit in the Modern 
 English Poets (Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., 1895), p. 333. 
 
34 An Age of Doubt 
 
 Selbstej'setzung des ChristentJiums — breathe a 
 different spirit from his PhilosopJiie des Un- 
 hewussten} One of the most cautious of our 
 younger students of philosophy has noted with 
 care, in a recent article, the indications that 
 "the era of doubt is drawing to a close." ^ A 
 statesman, like Signor Crispi, does not hesitate 
 to cut loose from his former atheistic connec- 
 tions and declare that "the belief in God is 
 the fundamental basis of the healthy life of 
 the people, while atheism puts in it the germ 
 of an irreparable decay." The French critic, 
 M. Edouard Rod, declares that " only religion 
 can regulate at the same time human thought 
 and human action." ^ Mr. Benjamin Kidd, 
 from the side of English sociology, assures 
 us that " since man became a social creature, 
 the development of his intellectual character 
 has become subordinate to the development 
 of his religious character," and concludes that 
 religion affords the only permanent sanction 
 for progress.* A famous biologist, Romanes, 
 
 1 James Orr, The Christian View of God and the WorM 
 (New York, Randolph, 1893), pp. 456, 457. See Appendix, 
 note 10. 
 
 2 The Methodist Beview, January, 1896. " The Return 
 to Faith," by Prof. A. C. Armstrong, Jr. 
 
 3 Edouard Rod, Les Idees Morales du Temps Present 
 (Paris, 1894), p. 304. 
 
 * Benjamin Kidd, Social Evolution (London, 1894), p. 245. 
 
An Age of Doubt 35 
 
 who once professed the most absolute rejec- 
 tion of revealed, and the most unqualified 
 scepticism of natural, religion, thinks his Avay 
 soberly back from the painful void to a posi- 
 tion where he confesses that " it is reasonable 
 to be a Christian believer," and dies in the 
 full communion of the church of Jesus. ^ 
 
 All along the line, Ave see men who once 
 thought it necessary or desirable to abandon 
 forever the soul's abode of faith in the unseen, 
 returning by many and devious ways from the 
 far country of doubt, driven by homesickness 
 and hunger to seek some path which shall at 
 least bring them in sight of a Father's house. 
 
 And meanwhile Ave hear the conscience, the The indomi- 
 
 ethical instinct of mankind, assertinsr itself ^^^^^ ^^'^■ 
 
 ° science. 
 
 with splendid courage and patience, even in 
 those Avho haA^e as yet found no sure ground 
 for it to stand upon. There is a sublime con- 
 tradiction betAA^een the positivist's view of man 
 as " the hero of a lamentable drama played in 
 an obscure corner of the universe, in virtue of 
 blind laws, before an indifferent nature, and 
 with annihilation for its denouement," ^ and the 
 doctrine that it is his supreme duty to sacrifice 
 himself for the good of humanity. Yet many 
 
 1 Thoughts on BeUgion, p. 196. 
 
 2 Madame L. Ackermann, 3Ia Vie (Paris, 1885), p. xviii. 
 
crusade in 
 France. 
 
 86 An Age of Doubt 
 
 of the sceptical thinkers of the age do not 
 stumble at the contradiction. They hold fast 
 to love and justice and moral enthusiasm even 
 though they suspect that they themselves are 
 the products of a nature which is blind and 
 dumb and heartless and stupid. Never have 
 the obligations of self-restraint, and helpful- 
 ness, and equity, and universal brotherhood 
 been preached more fervently than by some of 
 the English agnostics. 
 The new In France a new crusade has risen ; a cru- 
 
 sade which seeks to gather into its hosts men 
 of all creeds and men of none, and which pro- 
 claims as its object the recovery of the sacred 
 places of man's spiritual life, the holy land in 
 which virtue shines forever by its own light, 
 and the higher impulses of our nature are in- 
 spired, invincible, and immortal. On its ban- 
 ner M. Paul Desjardins writes the word of 
 Tolstoi, '-^Ilfaut avoi7' une dme; it is necessary 
 to haA^e a soul," and declares that the crusaders 
 will follow it wherever it leads them. " For 
 my part," he cries, '' I shall not blush certainly 
 to acknowledge as sole master the Christ 
 preached by the doctors. I shall not recoil if 
 my premisses force me to believe, at last, as 
 Pascal believed."! 
 
 1 Le Devoir Present, 45. 
 
An Age of Doubt 37 
 
 In our own land such a crusade does not yet The new 
 
 crusade i 
 America. 
 
 appear to be necessary. The disintegration of ^''"^"^ ^ ^^ 
 
 faith under the secret processes of general 
 scepticism has not yet gone far enough to make 
 the peril of religion evident, or to cause a new 
 marshalling of hosts to recover and defend the 
 forsaken shrines of man's spiritual life. When 
 the process which is now subtly working in so 
 many departments of our literature has gone 
 farther, it may be needful to call for such a 
 crusade. If so, I believe it will come. I be- 
 lieve that the leaders of thought, the artists, 
 the poets of the future, when they stand face 
 to face with the manifest results of negation 
 and disillusion, Avhich really destroy the very 
 sphere in which alone art and poetry can live, 
 will rise to meet the peril, and proclaim anew 
 with one voice the watchword, "It is necessary 
 to have a soul! And though a man gain the 
 whole world, if his soul is lost, it shall profit 
 him nothing." But meanwhile, before the fol- 
 lowing of the errors of France in literature and 
 art has led us to that point of S]3iritual impov- 
 erishment Avhere Ave must imitate the organized 
 and avowed effort to recover that which has 
 been lost, we see a new crusade of another 
 kind: a powerful movement of moral enthu- 
 siasm, of self-sacrifice, of altruism, even among 
 
a gospel of 
 leadership. 
 
 38 An Age of Doxiht 
 
 those who profess to be out of sympathy with 
 Christianity, which is a sign of promise, be- 
 cause it reveals a force that cries out for faith, 
 and for Christian faith, to guide and direct it. 
 The cry for Never was there a time when the fine aspira- 
 tions of the young manhood and young woman- 
 hood of our country needed a more inspiring 
 and direct Christian leadership. The indica- 
 tions of this need lie open to our sight on every 
 side. Here is a company of refined and edu- 
 cated people going down to make a college set- 
 tlement among the poor and ignorant, to help 
 them and lift them up. They declare that it is 
 not a religious movement, that there is to be 
 no preaching connected with it, that the only 
 faith which it is to embody is faith in human- 
 ity. They choose a leader who has only that 
 faith. But they find, under his guidance, that 
 the movement Avill not move, that the work 
 cannot be done, that it faints and fails because 
 it lacks the spring of moral inspiration which 
 can come only from a divine and spiritual 
 faith. And they are forced to seek a new 
 leader who, although he is not a preacher, yet 
 carries within his heart that power of religious 
 conviction, that force of devotion to the will of 
 God, that faith in the living and supreme 
 Christ, which is in fact the centre of Christian- 
 
An Age of Doubt 39 
 
 ity. All around the circle of human doubt 
 and despair, where men and women are going 
 out to enlighten and uplift and comfort and 
 strengthen their fellow-men under the perplex- 
 ities and burdens of life, we hear the cry for a 
 gospel which shall be divine, and therefore 
 sovereign and unquestionable and sure and vic- 
 torious. All through the noblest aspirations 
 and efforts and hopes of our age of doubt, we 
 feel the longing, and we hear the demand, for 
 a new inspiration of Christian faith. 
 
 These are the signs of the times. Surely we The signs of 
 must take note of them, surely we must labour 
 and pray to understand their true significance, 
 if we are to say anything to our fellow-men 
 which shall be worth our saying and their 
 hearing. 
 
 Renan made a strange remark not long be- 
 fore his death : " I fear that the work of the 
 Twentieth Century will consist in taking out 
 of the waste-basket a multitude of excellent 
 ideas which the Nineteenth Century has heed- 
 lessly thrown into it." The sceptic's fear is 
 the believer's hope. Once more the fields are 
 white unto the harvest. The time is ripe ; 
 ripe in the sorrow of scepticism, ripe in the 
 return of aspiration, ripe in the enthusiasm of 
 
 the times. 
 
40 A7i Age of Doubt 
 
 humanity, for a renaissance of the spiritual life. 
 Blessed are they who are come to the kingdom 
 for such a time as this, if indeed they believe 
 and preach a living, saving Gospel for this Age 
 of Doubt. 
 
II 
 
 THE GOSPEL OF A PERSON 
 
Subtlest thought shall fail and learning falter, 
 Churches change, forms perish, systems go, 
 
 But our human needs, they will not alter, 
 Christ no after age shall e'er outgrow. 
 
 Yea, Amen ! O changeless One, Thou only, 
 
 Art life's guide and spiritual goal, 
 Thou the Light across the dark vale lonely, — 
 
 Thou the eternal haven of the soul. 
 
 — John Campbell Shairp. 
 
II 
 
 THE GOSPEL OF A PERSON 
 
 The prevalence and the quality of modern How shall 
 doubt, with its discontent and sadness, its l^,!ese?iifV S* 
 self-misgivings and reactions, its moral incon- 
 sistencies and fine enthusiasms, bring the 
 preacher who is alive and in earnest, face to 
 face with the most important question of his 
 life. What can I do, what ought I to do, as 
 a preacher, to meet the strange, urgent, com- 
 plicated needs of such a time as this ? 
 
 First of all, as a man, — and every preacher 
 ought to be a man, though not every man is 
 bound to be a preacher — as a man, it is nec- 
 essary to lead a clean, upright, steadfast, use- 
 ful life, purged from all insincerity, and lifted 
 above all selfishness, and especially above that 
 form of religious selfishness which is the beset- 
 ting peril of those who feel themselves rich in 
 faith in the midst of a generation that has been 
 made poor by unbelief. Never has there been a 
 time when character and conduct counted for 
 43 
 
44 
 
 The Gospel of a Person 
 
 Proposed 
 
 remedies 
 insufficient. 
 
 more than they do to-day. A life on a liigh 
 level, yet full of helpful, healing sympathy 
 for all life on its lowest levels, is the first debt 
 which we owe to our fellow-men in this age. 
 
 But beyond this, is there not something per- 
 sonal and specific Avhich the conditions of the 
 23resent demand from us, as men who have not 
 only the common duty of living, but also the 
 peculiar vocation of speaking directly and con- 
 stantly to the inner life of our brothers ? We 
 want some distinct and definite message, which 
 is to be clearly formed in our thought and feel- 
 ing and utterance, as the central, guiding, domi- 
 nating force in all our efforts to realize the fine 
 aspiration of the old hymn : 
 
 " To serve the present age, 
 My calling to fulfil, — 
 Oh, may it all my powers engage 
 To do my Master's will ! " 
 
 Now the moment we look at the problem in 
 this light, we see that there are various lines 
 of activity open to us, and along all of these 
 lines men are making promises and prophecies 
 of usefulness and success. The cures which 
 are suggested for the malady of the age are 
 many and diverse. Of some of them we need 
 speak only in passing, to recognize that for 
 us, at least, they are unsuitable. 
 
The Gospel of a Person 45 
 
 Herr Max Nordau, for example, in his Reaction to 
 curious and chaotic book, Degeneration^ diag- 
 noses the sickness of modern times as the 
 result, not of a loss of faith, but of a fatal 
 increase of nervous irritability produced by 
 the strain of an intricate civilization. He 
 declares that the malady must run its course, 
 but that in time it will be healed by the re- 
 storative force of ^^ 771180 neism, that instinctive, 
 invincible aversion to progress and its difficul- 
 ties that Lombroso has studied so much and to 
 which he has given this name." ^ 
 
 The name is certainly not a pretty one, nor 
 do I think that, after the first feeling of pleas- 
 ure in learning to pronounce a newly imported 
 word has passed, the contemplation of its 
 meaning w^ill afford us any profound sense of 
 satisfaction or hope. The picture of mankind 
 as a magnified Jemmy Button, returning from 
 his temporary residence in England to his na- 
 tive Terra del Fuego, and flinging away his 
 gloves and patent-leather shoes, to relapse into 
 a peaceful and contented barbarism, is not in- 
 spiring. Who is there that would care to de- 
 vote his life to the hastening of such a result ? 
 Who but the veriest quack, himself affected by 
 the hysteria of the age, would think of curing 
 
 1 Max Nordau, Degeneration (New York, 1895), p. 542. 
 
46 The Gospel of a Person 
 
 the convulsions of St. Vitus' dance in an over- 
 strained humanity by throwing the patient into 
 the stupor of typhoid fever ? 
 Psychical Another and very different method of deal- 
 
 ing with the malady of the times is suggested 
 by those who believe that Science itself, in the 
 immense future advance which is predicted for 
 it, will supply the antidote for the scepticism 
 which has accompanied its previous course. 
 New discoveries will be made which will sup- 
 port the proposition : // faut avoir U7ie dme. 
 New arg-uments will be constructed which will 
 give us a scientific demonstration of the un- 
 seen universe and the future life. It is in 
 this spirit that Mr. F. W. H. Myers calls at- 
 tention to the phenomena of mesmerism and 
 hypnotism and telepathy, and suggests that 
 the need of the age is a more cordial and 
 general interest in the investigations of the 
 Society of Psychical Research. i I do not 
 think, for one, that these investigations are 
 to be slighted or despised. They may be of 
 great value. But it is difficult to believe that 
 this is the source to which the preacher is to 
 look either for his inspiration or his message. 
 For, in the first place, it is highly improbable 
 that science is about to make any such aston- 
 1 See Appendix, note 11. 
 
The Gospel of a Person 47 
 
 ishing advance, either in methods or results, 
 as some men anticipate. The best authorities 
 admit this, and warn us tliat there are "limi- 
 tations in the nature of the universe which 
 must circumscribe the achievements of sjDecu- 
 lative research." 1 Mr. Myers himself makes 
 the same admission, and says that so far as 
 our discoveries are confined to the physical 
 side of things, there is no ground whatever 
 for sanguine hope. Moreover, in the second 
 place, whatever work may be done in this di- 
 rection must be accomplished, not by preachers, 
 but by scientists. The average preacher has 
 no particular vocation, and no adequate qual- 
 ification, for the task. Neither by tempera- 
 ment nor by training is he fitted to judge 
 of these matters. Now and then you will find 
 a rare exception ; but as a rule nothing could 
 be of less value than the scientific sermons of 
 preachers who have only a bowing acquaint- 
 ance with science. If the cure of modern 
 scepticism is to be accomplished by the further 
 progress of physical investigation, at least we 
 must confess that this enterprise is not for us. 
 
 But there are two other ways of deal- 
 ing Avith current doubt which demand closer 
 attention. One of them is the philosophic 
 1 See Appendix, note 12. 
 
48 The Gospel of a Person 
 
 Thorough- method of a reductio ad ahsurdum. The logic 
 rationalism, ^f rationalism is applied to its own premisses 
 in order to show that they are unfounded and 
 unverifiable. The result of this attack, as it 
 has been made with a relentless and masterly 
 hand by the Hon. Arthur James Balfour in 
 his Defence of PhilosopJde Doubt., is to exhibit 
 the startling fact that '' the universe as repre- 
 sented to us by science is wholly unimaginable, 
 and that our conception of it is what in The- 
 ology would be termed purely anthropomor- 
 phic."^ The evidence for the existence of a 
 world composed of atoms and ether is no 
 more conclusive, the account which science 
 gives of their nature and qualities is no more 
 coherent, than the evidence and account which 
 faith gives of a world created by a personal 
 God and inhabited by immortal souls. Pure 
 agnosticism is thus forced into the service of 
 Christianity and used to destroy all a priori 
 objections to it. Giant Doubt is brought low 
 by turning his own Aveapons against himself, 
 even as Benaiah, the son of Jehoiada, slew the 
 Egyptian "with his own spear." ^ 
 
 The value of this service of philosophy is 
 
 1 A Defence of Philosophic Doubt (Macmillan, 1879), 
 pp. 284, 285, 287-289. See Appendix, note 13. 
 
 2 1 Chron. xi. 23. 
 
The Gospel of a Person 49 
 
 considerable. The Christian preacher onght 
 not to be ignorant of its actual results, for 
 they are such as to encourage him in preserv- 
 ing his independence against the tyrannous 
 claims of positivism ; nor unfamiliar with its 
 methods, for they are fitted to train and disci- 
 pline his mind by hard exercise and exact work. 
 But it must be remembered that only a mighty 
 man of valour, one who, like Benaiali, ranks 
 above the host, and above the thirty captains of 
 the host, can hope to play a leading part in this 
 enterprise of ''carrying the war into Africa." 
 It must be remembered also that the reduction 
 of scientific naturalism to an absurdity falls far 
 short of the establishment of religious faith as 
 a verity. Grateful for all that jjhilosophy can 
 do, and is doing, to clear the way, the preacher 
 must have a principle, an impulse, a line of 
 action which will carry him beyond the nega- 
 tive result of making unbelief doubtful, to the 
 positive result of making belief credible. 
 
 At this point our attention is called to an- Theological 
 other Avay of dealing with current scepticism, 
 — the dogmatic method, Avhicli relies for the 
 defence of faith upon the construction of a 
 complete and consistent system of doctrine in 
 regard tn (rod and man, the present world and 
 the future life. Faith, in other Avords, is to 
 
 f or titi cation. 
 
50 The Gospel of a Person 
 
 be established by fortification, surrounded and 
 entrenched with banquette and parapet, scarp 
 and ditch and counterscarp of iron-worded 
 proof, defended on every side by solid syllo- 
 gisms, and impregnable against all assaults of 
 unbelief. It is foolish not to recognize the 
 great work which has been done along this line 
 by wise and strong men in the past. Those 
 who affect to despise it and make light of it, 
 are simply ignorant of some of the loftiest 
 achievements of the human intellect. The 
 works of Augustine and Anselm and Thomas 
 Aquinas, of John Calvin and Richard Hooker 
 and John Owen, of Ralph Cud worth and 
 William Chillingworth, of Richard Baxter and 
 Samuel Clarke and Joseph Butler, of Jonathan 
 Edwards and Charles Hodge and W. G. T. 
 Shedd, are massive works. They impose a 
 sense of wonder upon every thoughtful ob- 
 server. 
 Chancjed But concerning the attempt to conquer mod- 
 
 ern doubt l)y a system of dogmatic theology, 
 certain things must be remembered. The con- 
 ditions of Avarfare change from age to age. 
 The vast fortresses of solid stone whose posses- 
 sion Avas once regarded as the security of 
 nations, are not ranked so high as tliey Avere 
 a hundred years ago. The eartliAvork, the 
 
The G-ospel of a Person 51 
 
 rifled cannon, the iron-clad ship, the torpedo, 
 have wrought great changes. Deductive logic 
 is just as strong as it ever was, but somehow or 
 other men are not as much impressed by it. 
 Induction is the method of to-day: and that is 
 a subtle, evasive, mobile method. It cannot 
 be shut in by a ring of fortresses. Already 
 the dogmatic systems in which the inductive 
 method is ignored or subordinated (whether 
 made long ago, or constructed yesterday as 
 modern antiques) are out of date. They are 
 good for the men who are within them, but 
 on the outside world they have no more effect 
 than Windsor Castle would have in protecting 
 England from a foreign invasion. 
 
 We feel sure that theology, in time, must The/uture 
 and will vindicate its claim to be considered as ^^ ^^^" 
 
 an essential factor in the intellectual life of 
 man, by adapting itself to the changed condi- 
 tions, and producing even mightier works by 
 the. new methods than those which it produced 
 l)y the old. Already we see the promise of a 
 renaissance of dogmatics in such books as Mul- 
 ford'sZ'Ae Republic of Grod, Harris' The jSelf- 
 .Revdatioii of G-od^Oi'v'a The Christian View of 
 God and the Worlds and Fairbairn's The Place 
 of Christ in Modern Theology. But we must 
 remember that even tliose who anticipate and 
 
52 The Gospel of a Person 
 
 Great things predict this reconstruction of the old truth on 
 
 demanded of ^ -i • i- n 
 
 the new the- ^^^® ^^^^'^ Imes most enthusiastically, recognize 
 oiogian. that it must be a long and difficult task, and 
 that the man who is to be a master-builder 
 must have a magnificent equipment. How ex- 
 hilarating at the first sight, but at the second 
 sight how overwhelming and discouraging, are 
 the demands of the age upon him who would 
 fain be an epoch-making theologian, as they are 
 stated, for example, in Mr. Balfour's Founda- 
 tions of Beliefs or in Dr. George A. Gordon's 
 inspiring Ijook The Christ of To-day.^ Truly it 
 appears that such a man must realize the sup- 
 position of St. Paul : he must speak with the 
 tongues of men and of angels, and have the 
 gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries 
 and all knowledge. Who is sufficient for these 
 things ? It will take a long time for the best 
 of us to learn all this. Perhaps the most of us 
 may never go so far. Meantime, whether we 
 are labouring toAvards that goal, or despairing 
 of it, we need something divinely simple and 
 divinely true that we can preach at once, di- 
 rectly, joyfully, fervently to the heart of the age. 
 A view of the world, a Welt-anschcmung^ is de- 
 sirable, perhaps in the long run necessary, for 
 the mind of man ; but there is another thing 
 1 See Appendix, note 14. 
 
Tlte Gospel of a Person 53 
 
 which is more desirable and of prior necessity, ^ starting- 
 and that is a standpoint of practical conviction jJ^-";^ J^/^g 
 from which to obtain such a view. It may be fi^''^^ neces- 
 but a foothold, only a single point of contact, * ^* 
 but we must have it, and it must be solid as a 
 fact. A complete and consistent theology is a 
 consummation most devoutly to be wished for ; 
 but before it can come there must be some- 
 thing else, — a living, active power of faith in 
 the soul. This power, as we believe, already 
 exists in every human being. But there is 
 only one thing tliat can awaken it and call it 
 into action, and that is a gospel^ a message 
 clear as light, which in its very essence is a 
 force to quicken and stir the soul. 
 
 We look out upon the world and we see that Preaching 
 some men have had such a gospel without be- ^^ pow;er. 
 ing in any sense finished and systematic theo- 
 logians. St. Paul and St. Peter and St. John 
 had it. St. Chrysostom and St. Francis of 
 Assisi and Savonarola had it. John Wesley 
 and George Whitfield had it. In different ages 
 and under different conditions these preachers 
 had the primal message which moves men to 
 believe. And in our own age, under our own 
 Qoi:Miitions, a like message has been proclaimed 
 with power. Pere Lacordaire preached such a 
 mesfsage in Notre Dame, and Canon Liddon in 
 
54 The Crospel of a Person 
 
 St. Paul's, to listening thousands. Bisliop 
 Brooks made it thrill like a celestial music 
 through the young manhood of America; and 
 Dwight L. Moody has spoken it with vigorous 
 directness in every great city that knows the 
 English tongue. In many things, in ecclesias- 
 tical relation, in theological statement, in dress, 
 in manner, in language, these preachers are 
 unlike. One thing only is the same in all of 
 them, and that is the source of their power. 
 Their central message, the core of their preach- 
 ing, is the piercing, moving, personal gospel 
 of Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God and Sav- 
 iour of mankind. This, in its simplest form ; 
 this, in its clearest expression ; this presenta- 
 tion of a person to persons in order that they 
 may first know, and then love and trust and 
 follow Him — this is pre-eminently the gospel 
 for an age of doubt. 
 
 The Gospel The adaptation of our central message, thus 
 conceived and thus expressed, to meet the 
 peculiar needs of a time of general scepticism, 
 is the theme of this lecture. 1 do not say that 
 this is the whole of Christianity. I do not say 
 that when the preacher has delivered this mes- 
 saofe in this form he has fulfilled all of his 
 
The Gospel of a Person 55 
 
 duties. He may have to bear testimony against 
 errors of thought and vices of conduct ; he is 
 certainly bound to give encouragement and 
 guidance to new efforts of virtue and new en- 
 terprises of benevolence in every field. But 
 his first and greatest duty, the discharge of 
 which is to give him influence over doubting 
 hearts and strength for all his other work, is 
 simply to preach Christ. 
 
 This gospel meets the needs of the present The gospel 
 time because it is the gospel of a fact. " ' 
 
 Personality is a fact. Indeed we may say 
 that it is the aboriginal fact ; the source of all 
 perception ; the starting-point of all thought ; 
 the informing and moulding principle of all 
 language. " All human observation implies 
 that the mind, the 'I,' is a thing in itself, a 
 fixed point in a world of change, of which world 
 of change its own organs form a part. It is the 
 same, yesterday, to-day, and to-morrow. It 
 Avas what it is, when its organs were of a dif- 
 ferent shape and consisted of different matter 
 from their present shape and matter. It will 
 be what it is, when they have gone through 
 other changes." 1 
 
 1 Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Liberty, Equality, Frater- 
 nity. Quoted by Hutton, Contemporary Thought, I., p. 114. 
 See Appendix, note 15. 
 
56 The Gospel of a Person 
 
 Personality This fact of a rational, free, conscious, persist- 
 dation. ®^^^ ^^^^ i^ ^^^^ foundation of all sensation and 
 
 of all reflection; it is the basis of physics as well 
 as of metaphysics. By contrast it gives us our 
 first notion of matter ; by resistance, our first 
 notion of force ; by operation, our first notion 
 of causality. It is a necessary assumption even 
 in the philosophies of agnosticism, positivism, 
 and materialism. They cannot move a step 
 without it. 
 
 " They reckon ill who leave me out." 
 
 To deny personality is to deny the possibility 
 of any kind of knowledge and reduce the uni- 
 verse to a blank. ^ 
 
 Moreover, it is not only true that the recogni- 
 tion of our own personality lies at the root of 
 perception and reasoning. It is also true that 
 contact with other personalities, conscious, in- 
 telligent, free, and persistent like ourselves, is 
 the gateway through wliich we reach the reality 
 of all external things. To a solitary mind the 
 outward world may be only a dream. But the 
 moment two minds come into contact and com- 
 munication, it becomes at least a permanent 
 possibility of sensation. By comparison and 
 contrast Avitli the sensations and experiences of 
 1 See Appendix, note 16. 
 
TJte Gospel of a Person 57 
 
 others, we verify our own. If it were not for 
 this the whole universe would dissolve around 
 us like the baseless fabric of a vision. The 
 subtle analysis of modern science, transforming 
 the apparently solid elements into invisible 
 atoms, and these atoms into vortex rings in 
 the impal^^able and immeasurable ether, throws 
 us back, more and more, upon personality, sub- 
 jective and objective, as the only thing that 
 remains sure and immutable. 
 
 Persons, then, are the most real and substan- Persons are 
 tial objects of our knowledge. They touch us 
 at more points, they affect us in more ways and 
 with greater intensity, they fit more closely into 
 the faculties and powers of our own being, than 
 anything else in the universe. A person who . 
 has influenced us or our fellow-men leaves a 
 more profound, positive, permanent, and real 
 impression than any other fact whatsoever. 
 AVe live as persons in a world of persons, far > 
 more truly than we live in a world of phenomena 
 or laws or ideas. 
 
 Now, in an age that is characterized, as some 
 German writer has said, by '' a hunger for facts," 
 the gospel of a person, if it is rightly appre- 
 hended and preached, ought to have peculiar 
 power because it is a factual gospel. We can 
 come to those who are under the benumbing 
 
58 The Gospel of a Person 
 
 spell of universal doubt and say : Here is a 
 fact, a personality, real and imperishable. It is 
 not merely a doctrine that was believed in Pales- 
 tine eighteen hundred years ago. It is some 
 one who was born and lived among men. It is 
 not merely a theory of God and the soul and 
 the future life that sprang up in the East in the 
 first century and has strangely spread itself 
 over the world. This religion is historical in 
 every sense of the word, as the actual fulfilment 
 of an ancient hope, and the starting-point of a 
 new life.^ 
 The reality xhe person of Jesus Christ stands solid in the 
 
 of Christ. 
 
 history oi man. He is indeed more substantial, 
 more abiding, in human apprehension, than any 
 form of matter, or any mode of force. The 
 conceptions of earth and air and fire and water 
 change and melt around Him, as the clouds 
 melt and change around an everlasting moan- 
 tain peak. All attempts to resolve Him into 
 a myth, a legend, an idea, — and hundreds of 
 such attempts have been made, — have drifted 
 over the enduring reality of His character and 
 left not a rack behind. The result of all criti- 
 cism, the final verdict of enlightened common- 
 sense, is that Christ is historical. He is such a 
 person as men could not have imagined if they 
 1 See Appendix, note 17. 
 
The Gospel of a Person 59 
 
 would, and would not have imagined if they 
 could. He is neither Greek myth, nor Hebrew 
 legend.^ The artist capable of fashioning Him 
 did not exist, nor could he have found the 
 materials. A non-existent Christianity did not 
 spring out of the air and create a Christ. A 
 real Christ appeared in the world and created 
 Christianity. This is what we mean by the 
 gospel of a fact. 
 
 II 
 
 And here we come at once into sight of the The gospel 
 
 . of a force. 
 
 second quality oi this gospel which is pecul- 
 iarly fitted to meet the needs of a doubting age. 
 If it be true that a person is a fact, it is no 
 less true that a person is a force. The world 
 moves by personality. All the great currents 
 of history have flowed from persons. Organi- 
 zation is powerful ; but no organization has 
 ever accomplished anything until a person has 
 stood at the centre of it and filled it with his 
 thought, with his life. Truth is mighty and 
 must prevail. But it never does prevail actu- 
 ally until it gets itself embodied, incarnated, in 
 a personality. Christianity has an organiza- 
 tion. Christianity has a doctrine. But the 
 force of Christianity, that which made it move 
 1 See Appendix, note 18. 
 
i''irlst ivas 
 Ills own 
 gospel. 
 
 60 The Gospel of a Person 
 
 and lent it power to move the world, is the Per- 
 son at the heart of it, who gives vitality to the 
 organization and reality to the doctrine. All 
 the abstract truths of Christianity might have 
 come into the world in another form, — nay, 
 the substance of these truths did actually come 
 into the world, dimly and partially through the 
 fragmentary religions of the nations, more 
 clearly and with increasing, prophetic light 
 through the inspired Scriptures of the He- 
 brews ; but still the world would not stir, still 
 the truth could not make itself felt as a univer- 
 sal force in the life of humanity until 
 
 " The Word had breath, and wrought 
 
 With human hands the creed of creeds, 
 hi loveliness of perfect deeds, 
 More strong than all poetic thought." ^ 
 
 I think we must get back, in our conception of 
 Christianity and in our preaching of it, to this 
 primary position. The fount and origin of its 
 power was, and continued to be, and still is, the 
 Person Christ. 
 
 This Avas the secret of His ministry. He 
 
 Himself was the central word of His own 
 
 preaching. He offered Himself to the world 
 
 as the solution of its difficulties and the source 
 
 1 Tennyson, In Memoriam, xxxvi. 
 
The Gospel of a Person 61 
 
 of a new life. He asked men simply to be- 
 lieve in Him, to love Him, to follow Him. He 
 called the self-righteous to humble themselves 
 to His correction, the sinful to confide in His 
 forgiveness, the doubting to trust His assur- 
 ance, and the believing to accept His guid- 
 ance into fuller light. ^ To those Avho became 
 His disciples He gave doctrine and instruction 
 in many things. But to those who v/ere not 
 yet His disciples, to the world, He offered first 
 of all Himself, not a doctrine, not a plan of 
 life, but a living Person. This was the sub- 
 stance of His first sermon when He stood up 
 in the sj^nagogue at Nazareth and having read 
 from the Book of Isaiah the prophecy of the 
 Great Liberator, declared unto the people 
 " This day is this Scripture fulfilled in your 
 ears." 2 This was the attraction of His univer- 
 sal invitation, '' Come unto Me, all ye that 
 labour and are heavy laden and I Avill give 
 you rest."^ This was the heart of His sum- 
 mary of His completed work when He said, "T, 
 if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all 
 men unto Me."* 
 
 1 Henry Latliara, Pastor rastorum (New York, James 
 Pott & Co,, 1891), pp. 278-275. 
 2St. Luke iv. 16-21. 
 
 3 St. Matt, xi, 28. 
 
 4 St. John xii. 32. 
 
62 The Giospel of a Person 
 
 We are not considering, at this moment, tlie 
 tremendous implications of such a personal 
 self-assertion, unparalleled, I believe, in the 
 founder of any other religion. We pass by 
 for the present that famous and inevitable 
 alternative, Aut Christus Deus, aut homo non 
 bonus est^ The point, now, is simply this. 
 As a matter of history, setting aside all ques- 
 tion of the divine inspiration and authority 
 of the Gospels, taking them merely as a 
 trustworthy report of a certain sequence of 
 events,^ it is plain that the force which started 
 the religion of Jesus was the person Jesus. 
 Christ was His own Christianity. Ciirist was 
 the core of His own gospel. 
 The life of Read on through the other books of the New 
 
 the Church i * i i t-i • i 
 
 noioedfrom iestament, the Acts and tlie .hpistlus, and you 
 Christ. ^yiii gee that they are just the record of the 
 
 operation of this force in life and literature. 
 
 It was this that sent the apostles out into the 
 
 1 See Appendix, not(! 10. 
 
 2 The evidence for the historic trustworthiness of the 
 Gospels may be found summed up in its modern form in Dr. 
 Sahnon's Introduction to the New Testament, fourth edition. 
 (New York, Young & Co., 1889); in Bishop Lightfoot's Es- 
 says on '"''Supernatural Beligion^'' (Macmillan, 1889); in 
 Beyschlag's New Testament Theology (Edinburgh, T. & T. 
 Clarlc, 1895), pp. 29-31, 216-221 of volume i. ; and in Prof 
 George P. Fisher's Grounds of Thoistic and Christian Be- 
 lief {i^crihucrs, 1883). ...,.: 
 
The Gospel of a Pet^son 63 
 
 world, reluctantly and hesitatingly at first, then 
 joyfully and triumphantly, like men driven by 
 an irresistible impulse. It was the manifesta- 
 tion of Christ that converted them,i the love 
 of Christ that constrained them,^ the power of 
 Christ that impelled them.^ He was their 
 certainty* and their strength.^ He Avas their 
 peace ^ and their hope.'^ For Christ they la- 
 boured and suffered ; ^ in Christ they gloried ; ^ 
 for Christ's sake they lived and died.^^ They 
 felt and they declared that the life that was in 
 them was His life.^i They were confident that 
 they could do all things through Christ which 
 strengthened them. 1^ The offices of the Church 
 — apostle, bishop, deacon, evangelist, — call 
 them by what names you will — were simply 
 forms of service to Him as iNIaster ; ^^ the 
 doctrines of the Church were simply unfold- 
 ings of what she had received from Him as 
 Teacher ; i* the worship of the Church, as dis ■ 
 tinguished from that of the Jewish Synagogue 
 and the Heathen Temple, was the adoration 
 of Christ as Lord.^^ 
 
 Now it Avas precisely tliis relation of the 
 
 1 Gal. i, 16. c Epli. ii. 14. n Gal. ii. 20. 
 
 2 2 Cor. V. 14. " Col. i. 27. 12 phn. [y^ 13. 
 
 3 2 Cor. xii. 9. ^ Phil. iii. 8-10. i3 Eph. iv. 8-12. 
 
 4 2 Tim. i. 12. ^ Gal. vi. 14. ^^ 1 Cor. xi. 1, 23 ; xv. 3. 
 6 2 Tim. ii. 1. i'^ 2 Cor. iv. 5, 11. i^ piiH. u. 1 1 ; 1 Cor. xii. 3. 
 
64 The Gospel of a P 
 
 erson 
 
 The influ- early Church, in her organization and doctrine 
 Tii^'t- 7 ^^^^ worship, to the person Christ, held fast 
 came from in her memory as identical with the real Jesus 
 "*"^^' who was born in Bethlehem and crucified on 
 
 Calvary, conceived in her faith as still living 
 and present with His disciples, — it was this 
 personal animation of the Clnirch by Christ 
 that gave her influence over men. Contrary 
 to all human probability, against the prejudice 
 of the Hebrews Avho abhorred the name of a 
 crucified man, against the prejudice of the 
 Greeks and Romans who despised the name 
 of a common Jew, she made her Avay, not by 
 concealing, but by exalting and glorifying, the 
 name of Jesus Christ. Indeed, it seems as if 
 her career of conquest was actually delayed 
 until that name was taken up and Avritten upon 
 her banners. It was in Antioch, where the 
 disciples were first called Christians,^ tliat the 
 missionary enterprise of the Church began, and 
 it was from that centre, witli that title, tliat 
 she went out to lier triumph. 
 T/ie manic The name of Clirist was magical ; not as a 
 secret and unintelligible incantation, but as 
 the sign of a real person, known and loved. 
 It enlightened and healed and quickened the 
 heart of an age which, like our own, was dark 
 1 Acta xi. 26-5 ;xiii. 1-3. 
 
 of Chrif^fs 
 Primr. 
 
The Gospel of a Person 63 
 
 and sorrowful and heavy with doubt. It was 
 the charm which drew men to Christianity out 
 of the abstractions of philosophy,^ and the con- 
 fusions of idolatry darkened with a thousand 
 personifications but empty of all true person- 
 ality. The music of that name rang through 
 all the temple of the Church, and to its har- 
 monies her walls were builded. The acknow- 
 ledgment of that name was the mark of Christian 
 discipleship. To confess that "Jesus is the 
 Christ " was the way to enter the Church. The 
 symbolism of that name was the mark of Chris- 
 tian worship. The central rites of the Church 
 were baptism into Christ and communion with 
 Christ. Fidelity to His name was the crown 
 of Christian martyrdom. Unnumbered multi- 
 tudes of men and women and children went 
 down to death because they would not deny 
 the Christ. Whatever the early Church 
 was and did, beyond a doubt her character 
 and her activity were but the resultant of 
 the personal influence that flowed from Jesus 
 Christ.2 
 
 When we turn to follow the history of Chris- 
 tianity through the later centuries down to the 
 
 1 See Justin Martyr, Dialogue loith Trypho, chap, viii, 
 
 2 George B. Stevens, The Pauline Theology. See Appen- 
 dix, note 20. 
 
66 
 
 The Gospel of a Person 
 
 Christ is 
 the charm 
 of Christi- 
 anity, 
 
 Thepersonai present time, we see that the same thing is 
 ^Chr7st^ true. The temporal power of the Bishop of 
 continues. Rome doubtless grew out of the union of the 
 Church with the Empire. The immense wealth 
 and secular authority of ecclesiastics may be 
 traced to social and political causes. But the 
 inward, vitalizing, self-propagating power of 
 Christianity as a religion has always come from 
 the person of Jesus who stands at the heart of 
 it. The attraction of its hymns and psalms and 
 spiritual songs, the beauty of its holy days and 
 solemn ceremonies, were derived from Him 
 who is the central figure in praise and prayer. 
 The renaissance of Christian Art sprang from 
 the desire to picture to the imagination the 
 visible, adorable form and face of Him whom 
 speculative theology had so often concealed or 
 obscured. The penetrating and abiding fra- 
 grance of Christian literature resides in those 
 books, like The Imitation of Christ, in which the 
 sweetness of His character is embalmed forever. 
 The potency of Christian preaching comes from, 
 and is measured by, the clearness of the light 
 which it throws upon the personality of Jesus. 
 Read the roll of those in every age whom the 
 world has acknowledged as the best Christians, 
 kings and warriors and philosophers, martyrs 
 and heroes and labourers in every noble cause, 
 
The Grospel of a Persoti 67 
 
 the purest and the highest of mankind, and you 
 will see that the test by which they are judged, 
 the mark by which they are recognized, is 
 likeness and loyalty to the personal Christ. 
 Then turn to the work which the Church is 
 doing to-day in the lowest and darkest fields 
 of human life, among the submerged classes of 
 our great cities, among the sunken races of 
 heathendom, and you cannot deny that the 
 force of that work to enlighten and uplift, still 
 depends upon the simplicity and reality with 
 which it reveals the person of Jesus to the 
 hearts of men. Christianity as a missionary 
 religion would be fatally crippled if you took 
 out of it the familiar story of Jesus and His 
 love. 
 
 "Mr. Darwin," says Admiral Sir James Sulli- ^^^ testi- 
 van, " had often expressed to me his conviction doubter. 
 that it was utterly useless to send missionaries 
 to such a set of savages as the Fuegians, proba- 
 bly the very lowest of the human race. I had 
 always replied that I did not believe any human 
 beings existed too low to comprehend the sim- 
 ple message of the Gospel of Christ. After 
 many years he wrote to me that the recent 
 account of the mission showed that he had been 
 wrong and I right . . . and he requested me 
 to forward to the Society an enclosed cheque 
 
68 
 
 The Gospel of a Person 
 
 The force 
 lohich 
 breaks the 
 inertia of 
 unbelief. 
 
 for <£5, as a testimony of his interest in their 
 good work." ^ 
 
 Observe, we are not constructing an argu- 
 ment. We are only tracing a force, — the 
 force that flows from the person of Jesus Christ. 
 The more closely, the more j^owerfully we can 
 feel it in ourselves and in others, the more confi- 
 dently we can come to a doubting age and say : 
 Here is this force, intense, persistent, far- 
 reaching. It has moved all kinds of men, 
 from the highest to the lowest. What do you 
 make of it ? What will you do with it ? Is 
 it not the only thing that can lift and move 
 you out of your doubt ? For scepticism is 
 just the inertia of the soul which stands 
 poised between contrary and mutually destruc- 
 tive theories. From that state of impotence 
 there is but one deliverance, and that is by 
 force, the force of life embodied in a person. 
 
 Ill 
 
 The gospel 
 of a real 
 spiritual 
 world. 
 
 But the force which proceeds from the person 
 of Jesus is not mere power, blind and purpose- 
 less. It moves always in a certain direction. 
 It has a quality in it which produces certain 
 
 1 Alfred Barry, Some Lights of Science on the Faith 
 (London, Longmans, 1892), p. 116. 
 
The Grospel of a Person 69 
 
 results. And one of these results is an im- 
 mediate and overwhelming sense of the reality 
 and nearness of spiritual things. This is the 
 third point of adaptation in the gospel of the 
 personal Christ to the needs of a sceptical age. 
 It carries with itself an evidence of things not 
 seen, a substance of things hoped for. 
 
 An aura of wonder and mystery surrounded Themijstenj 
 Jesus of Nazareth in His earthly life. All who 
 came in contact with Him felt it ; in love, if 
 they desired to believe ; in repulsion, if they 
 hated to believe. In His presence, faith in the 
 invisible, in the soul, in the future life, in 
 God, revived and unfolded with new bloom 
 and colour. In His presence hypocrisy was 
 silenced and afraid, but sincere piety found a 
 voice and prayed. This effluence of His char- 
 acter breathes from the whole record of His 
 life. It was not merely what He said to men 
 about the eternal verities that convinced them. 
 It was something in Himself, an atmosphere 
 surrounding Him, and a silent radiance shining 
 from Him, that made it easier for them to 
 believe in their own spiritual nature and in 
 the Divine existence and presence. He drew 
 out of their fallen and neglected hearts, by 
 some celestial attraction, spontaneous, gentle, 
 irresistible, a new efflorescence of faith and 
 
70 The Grospel of a Person 
 
 hope and love. Where He came a spiritual 
 
 springtide flowed over the landscape of the 
 
 inner life. Blossoms appeared in the earth 
 
 and the time for the singing of birds was come. 
 
 The effect of Faith was not imposed on doubting hearts 
 
 Hispres- 
 
 ence. by an external and mechanical process. It 
 
 grew in the warmth that streamed from Him. 
 It was not merely that men were at their best 
 in His company, except, indeed, those who 
 were at their worst through sullen resistance 
 and malignant alarm at His power. It was 
 that men were conscious of something far bet- 
 ter than their best, a transcendent force, an 
 influence from the unfathomable heights above 
 them. And to withstand it they must sink 
 below themselves, make new falsehoods and 
 new negations to bind them down, grapple 
 themselves more closely to the base, the 
 earthly, the sensual. But if they yielded to 
 that influence, it lifted and moved their 
 thoughts inevitably upward. It was not 
 merely what He told them of His own sight 
 of spiritual things. It was what they saw 
 reflected in His face and form of that loftier, 
 wider outlook. He was like one standing on a 
 high peak, reporting of the sunrise to men in 
 the dark valley. They heard His words. But 
 they saw also upon His countenance the glow 
 
The Gospel of a Pej^son 71 
 
 of dawn, and dazzling all about Him the 
 incommunicable splendours of a new day. 
 
 This was the effect of the personality of 
 Jesus, as He stood amid the shadows and un- 
 certainties of human life ; an effect strangely 
 overlooked and ignored, often even beclouded 
 and hidden, in much that has been written 
 about Him by theologians and historians. I 
 do not dream that I can put it into words. 
 But I know that it can be felt as a reality in 
 the Gospels. And I turn back to one who saw 
 Him face to face, one who touched His hand 
 and leaned upon His bosom, for the expression 
 of the soul-uplifting, faith-begetting wonder of 
 the person of Christ : The Word was made flesh 
 and dwelt among us, and ^ve beheld His glory, 
 the glory as of the only-hegotten of the Father, 
 full of grace and truths 
 
 Nor has this effect vanished from the world The influ- 
 with the removal of the bodily presence of picture. 
 Jesus. It has perpetuated itself by its own 
 vital power, increasing rather than diminish- 
 ing. It still flows from the picture of His life 
 which is preserved in the Gospels, from the 
 image of His character as it is formed in the 
 minds of men. Eliminate, if you please, what 
 is called the miraculous element. Make what 
 1 St. John i. 14. 
 
Christ 
 unique. 
 
 72 The Gospel of a Person 
 
 allowance you will for the enthusiasm and 
 unguarded utterance of His disciples. There 
 still remains that enthusiasm itself to be reck- 
 oned with, an enthusiasm which was kindled 
 by Him alone. There still remains the figure 
 of the person of Christ, who never can be 
 expressed in terms of matter and force, who 
 never can be explained by natural and histori- 
 cal causes, who carries us by His own inherent 
 mystery into the presence of the spiritual, the 
 divine, the supernatural. 
 
 Something of this spiritual light, I will ad- 
 mit, — nay, I Avill maintain with joyous and 
 firm conviction, — comes from every human 
 personality, even the lowliest, in so far as it 
 refuses to be summed uj^ in terms of sense 
 perception, in so far as it gives evidence, by 
 its affections and hopes and fears, of ele- 
 ments in man that are not of the dust. But 
 in Christ this light is transcendent and unique, 
 because He manifestly surpasses the ordinary 
 attainments of humanity, because He cannot 
 be accounted for by the laws of heredity 
 and environment. The more closely we apply 
 these laws, the more clearly He shines out 
 above them.^ 
 
 " The learned men of our day," says M. 
 1 J. S. Mill, Essays on Beligion, p. 253. 
 
The G-ospel of a Person 73 
 
 Pierre Loti in his latest book, La GalilSe, 
 "have endeavoured to find a human explica- 
 tion of His mission, but they have not yet 
 reached it. . . . Around Him, none the less, 
 there still glows a radiance of beams which 
 cannot be comprehended." ^ 
 
 Historically He appears alone, as no great Christ 
 
 1 1 1 i< • solitary. 
 
 man has ever appeared before or since. 
 
 Heroes, teachers, and leaders of men have 
 always been seen as central stars in larger 
 constellations, surrounded by lesser but kin- 
 dred lights. Plato shines in conjunction with 
 Socrates and Aristotle; Caesar with Pompey and 
 Crassus ; Luther with Melanchthon and Cal- 
 vin ; Shakespeare with Beaumont and Fletcher 
 and Ben Jonson ; Napoleon surrounded with 
 his brilliant staff of marshals and diplomats ; 
 Wordsworth among the mild glories of the 
 Lake poets. In every case, if you search the 
 neighbourhood of a great name, you will find 
 not a blank sky, but an encircling galaxy. 
 But Jesus Christ stands in an immense sol- 
 itude. Among the prophets Avho predicted 
 Him, among the apostles who testified of 
 Him, there is none worthy to be compared or 
 conjoined with Him. It is as if the heavens 
 were swept bare of stars ; and suddenly, un- 
 1 Pierre Loti, La Galilee (Paris, 1895), p. 93. 
 
Christ sin- 
 less. 
 
 74 The Gospel of a Person 
 
 expected, unaccompanied, the light of lights 
 appears alone, in supreme isolation. 
 
 Nor is there anything in His antecedents, 
 in His surroundings, to explain His appear- 
 ance and radiance. There was nothing in the 
 soil of the sordid and narrow Jewish race 
 to produce such an embodiment of pure and 
 universal love.^ There was nothing in the 
 atmosphere of that corrupt and sensual age 
 to beget or foster such a character of stainless 
 and complete virtue. Nor was His own life, 
 — I say it reverently, — judged by purely hu- 
 man and natural laws, calculated to result in 
 such an evident perfection as all men have 
 wonderingly recognized in Him. The high- 
 est type of human piety, the excellence of a 
 beautiful soul, has never been reached among 
 men without repentance and self-abasement. 
 But Jesus never repented, never abased Him- 
 self in shame and sorrow before God, never 
 asked for pardon and mercy. Alone, among 
 His followers who kneel at His command to 
 confess their unworthiness and implore for- 
 giveness. He stands upright and lifts a cloud- 
 less face to heaven in the inexplicable glory 
 
 i Amory H. Bradford, Heredity and Christian Problems 
 (New York, Macmillau, 1895), p. 266. See Appendix, 
 note 21. 
 
The Gospel of a Person 75 
 
 of piety without penitence. Moral perfection 
 of this kind is not only without a parallel ; 
 it is also without an approach. Men have 
 never attained to it, and there is no way for 
 them to climb thither. We can only look up 
 to that perfection, serene, sinless, unsurpassable, 
 and feel that here we are in sight of something 
 which cannot be expressed except by saying 
 that it is the glory of eternal spirit embodied 
 in a person. 
 
 IV 
 
 But the force which resides in the person The gospel 
 of Jesus is not exhausted in the production 
 of this profound impression of its own spirit- 
 ual and transcendent nature. It goes beyond 
 this result of a vivid sense of the reality 
 of the unseen. It has in itself a purifying, 
 cleansing powder, a delivering, uplifting, sanc- 
 tifying power. The Gospel of Christ is the 
 gospel of a person who saves men from sin.^ 
 And herein it comes very close to the heart 
 of a doubting age. 
 
 The great and wonderful fact of this expe- 
 rience, which can neither be questioned nor 
 fully explained, is not involved in the theo- 
 logical speculations which have gathered about 
 1 See Appendix, note 22, 
 
76 The Gospel of a Person 
 
 it. The person of Jesus stands out clear 
 and simple as a poAverful Saviour of sinful 
 men and women. In His presence, the publi- 
 can and the harlot felt their hearts dissolve 
 with I know not what unutterable rapture 
 of forgiveness. At His word, the heavy- 
 laden were mysteriously loosed from the 
 imponderable burden of past transgression. 
 He suffered with sinners, and even while 
 He suffered He delivered them from the 
 sharpest of all pains, — the pain of conscious 
 The power ^iwdi unpardoned evil. He died for sinners, 
 
 of ChrisVs 
 
 cross. according to His own word ; and ever since, 
 
 His cross has been the sign of rescue for 
 humanity. Whatever may be the nature 
 of that sublime transaction upon Calvary ; 
 whatever the name by which men call it, — 
 Atonement, Sacrifice, Redemption, Propitia- 
 tion ; whatever relations it may have to the 
 eternal moral law and to the Divine right- 
 eousness, — its relation to the human heart is 
 luminous and beautiful. It does take away 
 sin. Kneeling at that holy altar, the soul at 
 once remembers most vividly, and confesses 
 most humbly, and loses most entirely, all her 
 guilt. A sense of profound, unutterable relief, 
 a sacred quietude, diffuses itself through all 
 the recesses of the troubled spirit. Looking 
 
The Grospel of a Person 77 
 
 unto Christ crucified, we receive an assurance 
 of sin forgiven, which goes deeper than thought 
 can fathom, and far deeper than words can 
 measure. 
 
 " We may not know, we cannot tell 
 What pains He had to bear, 
 But we believe it was for us 
 He hung and suffered there. 
 
 " He died that we might be forgiven, 
 He died to make us good ; 
 That we might go at last to heaven, 
 Saved by His precious blood." 
 
 This is not theory, this is not philosophy, 
 this is not theology. It is veritable fact. The 
 person Jesus, living Avith men, dying for men, 
 has actually made this impression of pardon for 
 the past and hope for the future, upon the heart 
 of mankind. And from pure love of Him — a 
 love which is first of all and most of all a sense 
 of gratitude for this immeasurable service — 
 have blossomed, often out of the very abysses of 
 sin and degradation, the saintliest and sublimest 
 lives that the world has ever seen. 
 
 Now this, as I know from my own experience, 
 is the gospel for doubting men, and for an age 
 of doubt ; the gospel of a Person who is a fact 
 
78 The Gospel of a Person 
 
 and a force, an evidence of the unseen, and a 
 Saviour from sin. Can we preach it ? Will we 
 preach it ? Then one thing is necessary for 
 us, a thing which might not be necessary, 
 perhaps, if our message were of another kind. 
 
 All knowledge, of the world, of human na- 
 ture, of books, will be helpful and tributary ; 
 all gifts, of clear thought, of powerful speech, 
 of prudent action, will be valuable and should 
 be cultivated : but one thing will be abso- 
 lutely and forever indispensable. 
 To know If ^ye are to preach Christ we must know 
 
 the one Christ, and know Him in such a sense that we 
 
 thing need- can say with St. Paul that we are determined 
 not to know anything save Jesus Christ and 
 Him crucified.^ We must study Him in the 
 record of His life until His character is more 
 real and vivid to us than that of brother or 
 friend. We must imagine Him with ardent 
 soul, until His figure glows before our inward 
 sight, and His words sound in our ears as a 
 living voice. We must love with His love, and 
 sorrow with His grief, and rejoice with His joy, 
 and offer ourselves with His sacrifice, so truly, 
 so intensely that we can say, as St. Paul said, 
 that we are crucified by His cross and risen in 
 His resurrection. 2 We must trace the power 
 1 1 Cor. ii. 2. 2 Qal. ii. 20. 
 
The Gospel of a Person 79 
 
 of His life in the lives of our fellow-men, fol- 
 lowing and realizing His triumphs in souls 
 redeemed and sins forgiven, until we know 
 the rapture that thrilled the breast of a St. 
 Bernard, a St. Francis, a Thomas a Kempis, a 
 Samuel Rutherford, a Robert McCheyne ; the 
 chivalrous loyalty that animated a Henry Have- 
 lock, a Charles Kingsley, a Frederick Robert- 
 son, a Charles Gordon ; the deep devotion that 
 strengthened a David Brainerd, a Henry Mar- 
 ty n, a Coleridge Patteson. We must become 
 the brothers of these men through brotherhood 
 with Christ. We must kindle our hearts in 
 communion with Him, by meditation, by prayer, 
 and by service, which is the best kind of 
 prayer. No day must pass in which we do not 
 do something distinctly in Jesus' name, for 
 Jesus' sake. We must go where He would go 
 if He were on earth. We must try to do what 
 He would do if He were still among men. 
 And so, by our failure as well as by our effort, 
 by the very contrast between our incomplete- 
 ness and His perfection, the image of our Com- 
 panion and our saving Lord will grow radiant 
 and distinct within us. We shall know that 
 potent attraction which His person has exer- 
 cised upon the hearts of men, and feel in 
 our breast that overmastering sense of loyalty 
 
80 The Gospel of a Person 
 
 to Him, which alone can draw us to follow 
 Him through life and death. 
 
 " If Jesus Christ is a man, — 
 And only a man, — I say 
 That of all mankind I cleave to Him^ 
 And to Him will I cleave alway, 
 
 " If Jesus Christ is a God, — 
 And the only God, — I swear 
 I will follow Him through heaven and hell, 
 The earth, the sea, and the air."i 
 
 1 Richard Watson Gilder, " Song of a Heathen, sojourning 
 in Galilee, a.d. 32." 
 
Ill 
 
 THE UNVEILING OF THE FATHER 
 
" He, who from the Father forth was sent, 
 Came the true Light, light to our hearts to bring; 
 The Word of God, — the telling of His thought ; 
 The Light of God, — the making visible ; 
 The far-transcending glory brought 
 In human form with man to dwell ; 
 The dazzling gone — the power not less 
 To show, irradiate, and bless ; 
 The gathering of the primal rays divine. 
 Informing Chaos to a pure sunshine ! " 
 
 — Geokge MacDonald. 
 
Ill 
 
 THE UNVEILING OF THE FATHEE 
 
 In the famous fifteenth chapter of The De- AscepH&s 
 dine and Fall of the Roman JSmpi7'e^ that 
 
 painstaking historian and superficial sceptic, 
 Edward Gibbon, Esq., introduces an account of 
 the rise and spread of the Christian Religion. 
 He attributes its remarkable triumph over the 
 established religions of the earth to a series of 
 causes which he ironically describes as sec- 
 ondary, and uniformly treats as primary. He 
 exhibits them as in themselves sufficient to 
 explain the peculiarly favourable reception of 
 the Christian faith in the world, and sets aside 
 the question of a possible divine origin as 
 unnecessary. With serene self-satisfaction he 
 traces the rapid growth of the Christian Church 
 to the five following causes : I. The Zeal of 
 the Christians^ derived from the Jews, — but 
 purified from that narrow and unsocial spirit 
 which, instead of inviting, had deterred the 
 Gentiles from embracing the law of Moses. 
 83 
 
 the spread of 
 Christian- 
 ity. 
 
ness of this 
 view 
 
 84 The Unveiling of the Father 
 
 II. The Doctrine of a Future Life^ improved 
 by every additional circumstance which could 
 give weight and efficacy to that important 
 truth. III. The Miraculous Foivers ascribed 
 to the primitive Church. IV. The Fure and 
 Austere Morals of the Christians. V. The 
 Union and Biscipline of the Christian Republic^ 
 Avhich gradually formed an increasing and in- 
 dependent state in the heart of the Roman 
 empire.^ 
 The shallow- Now this is a very fair, we may even say a 
 brilliant, example of the kind of work which 
 was done by the shallow and complacent scep- 
 ticism of a century ago. But the moment we 
 subject it to the more searching analysis of the 
 scepticism of the present age, it dissolves into 
 a thin and incoherent absurdity. For it is 
 evident that, so far from giving an explanation 
 of the growth of Christianity, Gibbon is simply 
 describing some of the phenomena which ac- 
 companied that growth. What, for example, 
 is " the zeal of the Christians " but an unillu- 
 minating name for a contagious and irresistible 
 enthusiasm which spread through the world 
 in connection with faith in Christ ? What is 
 
 1 Edward Gibbon, Esq., A History of the Decline and 
 Fall of the Boman Empire (London, John Murray, 8th 
 Edition, 1854), vol. ii., p. 152. 
 
The Unveiling of the Father 85 
 
 '* the union and discipline of the Christian re- 
 puHic " but a description, without explanation, 
 of the organic unfolding of a new, myste- 
 rioMs principle of fellowship. These alleged 
 " causes," more closely examined, are in fact 
 the very things that require to be accounted 
 for. Instead of clearing up the mystery, they 
 increase it. 
 
 By a singular fatality of language, the seep- The " ex- 
 tical historian has embodied in the statement ^^^^^^ ^^ ^^ 
 of his position the demonstration of its insuf- explained. 
 ficiency. In each of his causes, and in the 
 relation that subsists between them, he has 
 practically suggested a difficulty which de- 
 mands another and a higher solution of the 
 whole problem. Examine his words carefully. 
 
 By what means, human or divine, was the Questions 
 
 ti^li i oil (1p^ 
 
 zeal of the Christians ' purified from the narrow „^^^^^^ ^^ 
 and unsocial spirit of the Jews ' ? The natural (^n 
 history of sects and schisms teaches us that 
 their invariable tendency is to intensify rather 
 than to eliminate bigotry and exclusiveness. 
 Through what influence was the doctrine of a 
 future life ' improved by every additional cir- 
 cumstance that could give it weight and effi- 
 cacy ' ? The inevitable course of its human 
 development under the guidance of abstract 
 philosophy has been towards vagueness, cold- 
 
 swe7\ 
 
86 The Unveiling of the Father 
 
 ness, and uncertainty; under the guidance of 
 concrete su^^erstition, towards j^uerility and 
 crass sensualism. On what grounds were mir- 
 aculous powers ascribed to the early Church ? 
 They must have been ascribed truly or falsely. 
 If truly, there must have been some basis of 
 fact for them to rest upon. If falsely, the 
 Christians themselves were either ignorant, 
 or cognizant, of the falsehood. Take the 
 former supposition, and you present yourself 
 with the inex^^licable theory that what Pliny 
 the Younger called super stltio prava immodica, 
 and imagined would be easily and certainly ex- 
 tirpated, was able to hold its own against all 
 the assaults of learning and philosophy. Take 
 the latter supposition, and you are forced to the 
 incredible assumption that a conscious decep- 
 tion was the fountain of hisrhest and strongest 
 moral force that the world has ever felt.^ 
 How then did the " pure and austere morals of 
 the Christians " come into existence ? From a 
 lie, or from a truth? If from a truth, what 
 was the nature of that truth, in what form was 
 it expressed, and how did it win credence ? 
 
 1 Carlyle, Heroes and Hero- Worship^ sect. ii. : "A false 
 man found a religion ? Why, a false man cannot even build 
 a brick house ! If he do not know and follow truly the 
 properties of mortar, burnt clay, and what else he works in, 
 it is no house that he makes, but a rubbish heap." 
 
The Unveiling of the Father 87 
 
 And, finally, liow did " the Christian republic " 
 succeed in maintaining and increasing itself as 
 an independent state in the heart of the Roman 
 empire ? Every other attempt to do this par- 
 ticular thing, by secret philosophic doctrine, or 
 by open political organization, failed, and was 
 violently crushed by imperial power, or silently 
 dissolved and absorbed by imperial statesman- 
 ship. How was it that this one invisible fel- 
 lowship, this one visible organization, lived, 
 and spread, and stood out at last, serene, com- 
 plete, and magnificent, when the time-worn 
 ruins of the empire crumbled around it ? ^ 
 
 The answer to these questions is found in the The answer 
 person of Christ. This is not a matter of choice. *^ Ohnst. 
 It is a matter of necessity. For if He was, as 
 all candid observers will admit, the originator 
 and animator of Christianity, then to stop short 
 of Him in our inquiry as to the causes of its 
 existence and progress is to stop half-way, as 
 if one should account for the flow of the Nile, 
 after the fashion of the ancient geographers, by 
 attributing it to the melting of the snows on 
 the Mountains of the Moon, instead of tracing 
 it to its great fountain in the Albert Nyanza. 
 
 Christ stands above and behind the Church, 
 and all these secondary causes which have been 
 1 See Appendix, note 23. 
 
88 The Unveiiing of the Father 
 
 ChHst, the enumerated to account for her growth and 
 creator of -, c tt- 
 
 Christian- power now directly irom Him. He it was who 
 '^^y- purified and humanized the zeal of Christians, 
 
 so that they emerged from the narrowest of 
 races to preach the broadest and most universal 
 of all religions. He it was who cleared and 
 enlarged their view of immortality, so that it 
 became at once important and efficacious, the 
 only doctrine of a future life that has exercised 
 a direct and uplifting influence upon the pres- 
 ent life. He it was who endowed the Church 
 with whatever powers she possessed. He it w^as 
 who cleansed and ennobled her moral ideals and 
 gave her the only pattern and rule of virtue 
 which has been universally acknowledged as 
 self-consistent, satisfactory, and supreme. He 
 it was who cemented her union and strength- 
 ened her discipline to such an indestructible sol- 
 idarity, that the tie which bound the individual 
 soul to Him was regarded as superior to all 
 earthly relations, and the fellowship which that 
 common tie created, surpassed and survived all 
 fellowships of race, of culture, of nationality. 
 
 These are simple historical facts. In stating 
 them we make no assumptions and propound 
 no theories. It is not necessary to take any- 
 thing for granted or to adopt any particular 
 theological or philosophical system, in order to 
 
The Unveiling of the Father 89 
 
 see clearly and beyond the possibility of mis- 
 take that all the force and influence of Chris- 
 tianity in the world have, as a matter of fact, 
 flowed directly from Jesus Christ and from the 
 faith which He has inspired in the hearts of men. 
 
 The one question of supreme importance, Who, then, 
 then, if we would understand Avhat Christian- ^* '^^ " 
 ity really means, is, Who is this person who 
 stands at the centre of it and fills it with life 
 and strength? What did the first Christians 
 see in Him that made them believe in Him so 
 absolutely and implicitly and gave them power 
 to do such mighty works? What has the 
 church seen in Him through the ages that has 
 bound her to Him as her living Lord and Mas- 
 ter ? And what are we to see in Him if He is 
 to be^in deed and in truth the theme of our 
 gospel? What think ye of Christ? 
 
 This question, you see, is vital and inevitable. ^^^ inevi- 
 If we are to have a Christianity which is real ^^^^^ 
 and historical, we must get into line with his- 
 tory. If we are to have behind us the power 
 which comes from actual achievements of our 
 gospel in the Avorld, we must understand the 
 relation which it has always held to the person 
 of Christ. If we are to be in any sense the 
 followers of the first Christians, and to share the 
 joy and peace and power of their religion, we 
 
90 
 
 The Unveiling of the Father 
 
 The historic 
 ansioer. 
 
 must take the view which they took, of Jesus 
 of Nazareth. 1 
 
 Now, the object of this lecture may be stated 
 in a single sentence. It is to show that the 
 first Christians saw, and that the Church has 
 always seen, in Jesus Christ a real incarnation 
 of God ; a true and personal unveiling of the 
 Father ; God in Christ, reconciling the world 
 unto Himself. In other words, not only must 
 we find in Jesus Christ the centre of Christian- 
 ity, but we must also behold an actual divinity 
 as the centre of life in Jesus Christ. 
 
 ChnsVs 
 Godhood 
 sloioly re- 
 vealed. 
 
 We are not to suppose that faith in Christ 
 began with a clear and definite conception of 
 His divinity. On the contrary, it is evident 
 from the whole gosjDcl record that the idea that 
 Christ was divine gradually developed and un- 
 folded in the minds of those who knew and 
 loved and trusted Him. The idea of an incar- 
 nation was foreign to the Hebrew mind. There 
 was no race in the world that held so strongly 
 to the thought that God was solitary, unsearch- 
 able, and incommunicable. They believed that 
 even His true name could not be pronounced 
 by human lips, and that it was impossible for 
 1 See Appendix, note 24. 
 
The Unveiling of the Father 91 
 
 human eyes really to behold His glory. And 
 the very strength of this ancestral faith of 
 theirs, standing as it must have done directly 
 in the way of belief in an incarnation, is an evi- 
 dence of the tremendous power and unquestion- 
 able reality of the experience which forced the 
 disciples, by slow degrees, to believe firmly and 
 unhesitatingly in the divinity of Christ. 
 
 The process by which this result was accom- The gradual 
 plished lies open to our thought in the New ^"'^^e^*^/ 
 
 fiXtZft • 
 
 Testament. We must go back to tlie point in- 
 dicated in the second lecture. It was the im- 
 pression made upon the disciples by Christ's 
 own manifestation of Himself, His character, 
 His actions, and His words, evidently consistent 
 and unique, which led them at last to see in 
 Him the object of divine faith and worship. 
 He was not a mere man. That was evident and 
 undeniable. He was higher than men ; holier 
 than men ; He possessed an excellence and a 
 power which made them feel in His presence 
 that He was more than they were. What then 
 was He ? There were but two directions in 
 which their faith could move. The alternative 
 was sharply set before the disciples on that 
 memorable day at Csesarea Philippi, when Christ 
 asked them first, "Whom do men say that I, the 
 Son of man, am ? " and then, " But whom say ye 
 
92 The Unveiling of tlie Father 
 
 that I am ? " There were but two lines open to 
 them. One was the line of popular superstition, 
 which led them back into the past to see in 
 Christ only the ghost of John the Baptist, or 
 Elias, or one of the prophets come to life again. 
 The other was the new line of Christian faith 
 which led them forward to see in Jesus " the 
 Christ, the Son of the living God." ^ 
 The new New ? Of course it was new ! It had to be 
 
 ineo ins- ^-^^^^ ^j-^ order to fit the facts, which were such 
 
 tian oelief. ' ' 
 
 as had never been seen before. And just be- 
 cause it was so new it had to unfold itself by 
 degrees to the fulness of conscious apprehension 
 of all that it involved. 
 What it It is evident that the disciples did not know 
 
 meant to he ^ , i i /->ii . i i 
 
 the Christ. ^^ ^^^^^ what was meant by the Christhood, 
 the Messiahship, the fulfilment of all ancient 
 prophecy and sacred ritual in Jesus. But they 
 learned the lesson as they kept company with 
 Him. They heard Him speak with an author- 
 ity which none of the prophets had ever claimed. 
 Recognizing a divine inspiration in the Old 
 Testament Scriptures, He distinctly set Him- 
 self above them as the bringer of a new and 
 better revelation. He accomplished, interpreted, 
 and revised them. " Ye have heard how it hath 
 been said by them of old time " — by whom ? 
 1 St. Matt. xvi. 13-16. 
 
The Unveiling of the Father 93 
 
 By the lawgivers and prophets and psalmists 
 whom Christ recoG^nized as His own forerun- 
 ners and foretellers. " But I say unto you, 
 love your enemies, bless them that curse you, 
 and pray for them that despitefully use you." ^ 
 
 Suppose that this Avere all ; suppose that the Anewpoioer 
 Sermon on the Mount were the whole of the truth. 
 New Testament, what should we behold in it ? 
 Not merely the amazing revelation of a morality 
 more pure and perfect than any other the human 
 heart has conceived, proceeding from the lips 
 of an unlearned Nazarene peasant of the first 
 century, but the absolutely overwhelming sight 
 of a believing Hebrew placing Himself above 
 the rule of His own faith, a humble teacher 
 asserting supreme authority over all human 
 conduct, a moral reformer discarding all other 
 foundations, and saying, " Every one that hear- 
 eth these sayings of mine and doeth them, I 
 will liken him unto a wise man Avhich built his 
 house upon a rock." 2 Nine and forty times, in 
 the brief and fragmentary record of the dis- 
 courses of Jesus, recurs this solemn phrase 
 with which He authenticates the truth: Verily^ 
 I say unto you. And every time that the dis- 
 ciples heard it they must have gotten a new 
 idea of what it meant to be the Christ. 
 
 1 St. Matt. V. 43, 44. 2 st. Matt. vii. 24. 
 
relation to 
 humanity. 
 
 94 The Unveiling of the Father 
 
 A nev) Think also of the significance which the 
 
 favourite Messianic title used by Jesus to de- 
 scribe Himself must have had to their minds. 
 He called Himself " the Son of man. " i Why ? 
 Was it because He was merely human ? If 
 that was all, surely it would not need to 
 be asserted and emphasized again and again. 
 Imagine any other man, the highest and the 
 holiest, insisting upon the reality of his human 
 life, dwelling upon it, repeating the assertion 
 of it over and over. But this title was, in fact, 
 the claim to a peculiar and supreme relation to 
 the human race. Christ was not a son of man, 
 but the Son of man, one who, in the luminous 
 words of Irenseus, recapitidavit in se ipso longam 
 hominum expositionem.^ And as such He as- 
 sumed on earth and in His prevision of heaven 
 a position which no mere man could rightly 
 take. " The Son of man hath power on earth 
 to forgive sins."^ "The Son of man is Lord 
 also of the Sabbath." * "When the Son of 
 man shall come in His glory, and all the holy 
 
 1 In St. Matthew, 30 times ; in St. Luke, 25 times ; in 
 St. Mark, 14 times. See Appendix, note 25. 
 
 2 Irenseus, Adv. Hcer., iii. 18. 1 : "He summed up in 
 himself the long unfolding of humanity." The Syriac ver- 
 sion of this passage is equally beautiful and significant: 
 " He commenced afresh the long line of men." 
 
 3 St. Matt. ix. 6. ■* St. Mark ii. 28. 
 
The Unveiling of the Father 95 
 
 angels with Him, then shall He sit upon the 
 throne of His glory ; and before Him shall be 
 gathered all nations, and He shall separate 
 them one from another, as a shepherd divideth 
 the sheep from the goats." ^ 
 
 Consider what this implied. It was a decla- ^ supreme 
 ration that Jesus expected, and was willing, to ^^/gl^lhe 
 take into His own hands the task of discrimi- woj-ld. 
 nating between the good and the bad in the 
 unsearchable confusions and complexities of 
 the human heart, and of determining, without 
 hesitation, without misgiving, without redress, 
 the final destinies of the untold myriads of 
 men ; " an office," it has been well said, " in- 
 volving such spiritual insight, such discern- 
 ment of the thoughts and intents of the heart 
 of each one of the millions at His feet, such 
 awful, unshared supremacy in the moral world, 
 that the imagination recoils in sheer agony 
 from the task of seriously contemplating the 
 assumption of these duties by any created in- 
 telligence." ^ When the disciples heard their 
 Master declare that He would fulfil this office 
 of Judge of the World, they must have begun 
 to feel what it meant to be the Christ. 
 
 1 St. Matt. XXV. 31, 32. 
 
 2 H. P. Liddon, The Divinity of Our Lord (London, 
 1885), p. 176. 
 
96 The Unveiling of the Father 
 
 What it ]s^or do I suppose that tliey realized at first 
 
 the Son of ^^^^ ^^^^^ intention of tliat second plirase in 
 God. which their view of Jesus was expressed. The 
 
 Son of the living God^ — that also was an idea 
 to be gradually apprehended and unfolded. 
 And think what light must have fallen upon 
 it from the conduct of Jesus as they followed 
 Him from day to day. The more closely they 
 knew Him, the more deeply they felt His sin- 
 less purity and sovereign virtue. There was a 
 certainty, an independence, a freedom from all 
 effort and from all restraint in His goodness, 
 such as no other good man has ever shown. 
 He had the deepest knowledge of the evil of 
 sin, yet no shadow or stain of it fell upon His 
 own soul. He was on terms of closest inti- 
 macy — an intimacy such as no saint ever 
 dared to assume — with God. He conversed 
 with the Father in a friendship which was 
 utterly without fear or regret or misgiving. 
 Now when the disciples saw this, it must have 
 put them upon deep thoughts, and the guidance 
 to these thoughts was given by Christ's own 
 words about Himself. He put Himself side by 
 side with the Divine activity. " My Father 
 worketh hitherto and I work."^ The Jcavs 
 who heard Him say this, sought to kill Him, 
 1 St. John V. 17. 
 
 ChrisVs own 
 loords. 
 
The Unveiling of the Father 97 
 
 because He had not only broken the Sabbath, 
 but said also that God was His Father, making 
 Himself equal with God. And if the Jews 
 thought this, what did His own disciples think ? 
 He claimed a Divine origin and mission : " I 
 came forth from the Father ; " ^ " My Father 
 sent me. " ^ He claimed a Divine knowledge and 
 fellowship : " No man knoweth the Father save 
 the Son; "3 "O righteous Father, the world 
 hath not known Thee, but I have known 
 Thee."'* He claimed to unveil the Father's 
 being in Himself : " He that hath seen me hath 
 seen the Father. I am in the Father and the 
 Father in me."^ 
 
 To what conclusion must such conduct and The 
 such words as these lead the disciples in their conclusion. 
 interpretation of the true meaning of the title 
 "the Son of God"? A conclusion which Jesus 
 Himself, if He was as wise and good as all men 
 admit, must inevitably have foreseen. A con- 
 clusion which He Himself, if He had been only 
 a holy man, better than His disciples but of 
 the same nature, would certainly have guarded 
 against and prevented at any cost. A con- 
 clusion which is expressed in the attitude of 
 
 1 St. John xvi. 28. 3 st. Matt. xi. 27. 
 
 2 St. John xii. 49. * St. John xvii. 25. 
 
 5 St. John xiv. 9, 11. 
 
10 as Divine. 
 
 98 The Unveiling of the Father 
 
 Thomas, kneeling at the feet of Christ and 
 crying, "My Lord and my God."^ A conclu- 
 sion which is finally and definitively embodied 
 in the action of the apostles going out into the 
 world to disciple all nations, and to baptize 
 them " into the name of the Father, and of the 
 Son, and of the Holy Ghost." 2 
 
 II 
 
 The disci- There cannot be any question as to the state 
 
 ^that Christ ^^ mind Avliich this action implied. It was the 
 deep conviction, not necessarily reasoned out 
 and formulated, but lying at the very root of 
 conduct, that Jesus Christ the Son was the un- 
 veiling of His Father God, and that the Holy 
 Spirit who came upon the disciples was the 
 Spirit of the Father and the Son. The part 
 which the resurrection played in the clarifying 
 and confirming of this conviction was impor- 
 tant. But we must not misunderstand the 
 meaning of the resurrection. It was not in 
 any sense a new and different revelation of 
 God, imagined or actually received. Whatever 
 the form in which Jesus appeared to the dis- 
 ciples during the forty days that followed His 
 death, He was recognized as the same Jesus ; 
 and the one effect of His appearance was 
 
 1 St. Jolm XX. 28. 2 gt. Matt, xxviii. 19. 
 
The Unveiling of the Father 99 
 
 simply to confirm and deepen the truth of what 
 He had said and done while He was with them. 
 And with this confirmation the truth took shape 
 and substance as an active and enduring power 
 in human faith and life and worship. 
 
 There is no more room for doubt that the 
 early Christians saw in Christ a personal un- 
 veiling of God, than that the friends and fol- 
 lowers of Abraham Lincoln regarded him as a 
 good and loyal American citizen of the white 
 race.^ And even if we could find no direct and 
 definite statement of either of these views, the 
 evidence that men held them could be clearly 
 and certainly read in the facts of history. 
 
 Divine honours were paid to Christ in the The early 
 primitive Church. The first common prayer y^orsUpped 
 of the disciples, when they were assembled to Christ. 
 choose an apostle in the place of the traitor 
 Judas, was addressed to Christ. ^ The Chris- 
 tians were distinguished both from the Jews 
 and from the heathen as those who called upon 
 the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.^ The dying 
 martyr Stephen showed what was meant by this 
 phrase in his prayer, " Lord Jesus, receive my 
 spirit."^ Saul of Tarsus, when he was con- 
 
 1 See Appendix, note 26. 
 
 2 Acts i. 24. See Alford in loc. 
 
 3 Acts ix. 21 ; 1 Cor. i. 2. * Acts vii. 59. 
 
too The Unveiling of the Father 
 
 vinced by that strange experience on the road 
 to Damascus that Jesus was not an impostor, 
 but the Christ, at once addressed Him in 
 prayer, " Lord, what wilt thou have me to 
 do?"^ And Ananias, who received Saul into 
 the Church, asked guidance and direction from 
 the same Lord.^ Peter baptized the multi- 
 tudes on the day of Pentecost in the name of 
 Jesus Christ.^ John wrote of prayer to the 
 Son of God as a familiar ground of confidence 
 in Christian experience.* The apostolic bene- 
 diction was : " The grace of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ, and the love of God, and the communion 
 of the Holy Ghost be with you all."^ The 
 whole current of adoration and devotion in the 
 New Testament leads up naturally and without 
 surprise to the magnificent words of St. Paul, 
 in which he speaks of " Christ, who is over all, 
 God blessed forever."^ 
 
 It should be frankly recognized that the first 
 Christians assigned a certain subordination to 
 the Son in relation to the Father ; but it must 
 be admitted with equal candour that this sub- 
 ordination was not in any sense a separation, 
 
 1 Acts ix. 6. 2 Acts ix. 13. ^ Acts ii. 38. 
 
 * I John V. 13-15. 5 2 Cor. xiii. 14. 
 
 6 Rom. ix. 5. Cf. Stevens, Tlie Pauline Theology, p. 201, 
 for a succinct statement of the grounds on which this inter- 
 pretation of the text is preferred. 
 
Tlce Unveiling of the Father 101 
 
 and that it really implied and involved a unity 
 between them which made it possible and nat- 
 ural and inevitable for the disciples to pay an 
 adoration to the Son with the Father, which, if 
 it had been offered to, or claimed by, the great- 
 est and best of the apostles, would have been 
 instantly repudiated by the whole Church as 
 not only absurd but radically blasphemous. 
 
 It is an easy matter to trace the worship of 
 Christ in the later development of Christianity. 
 There are two sources of evidence : the Chris- 
 tian hymns and liturgies ; the heathen attacks 
 and the apologies which they evoked. 
 
 The earliest hymns of the Greek Church, the The testi- 
 " Thanksgiving at lamplighting," " Shepherd of hyj^^^s^ 
 tender youth," " The Bridegroom cometh," the 
 '' Hymn to Christ after Silence," celebrate the 
 praise of the Lord Jesus. Syriac poetry, through 
 its great poet, Ephrem Syrus, takes up the same 
 strain of adoration to the Son of God, and its 
 undying music may still be heard among the 
 mountains of Armenia where the unspeakable 
 Turk is exterminating a whole race for loyalty 
 to the name of Christ. Latin hymnody, from 
 its earliest origin in translations from the Greek 
 like the Gloria in Excelsis and the Te Beum^ 
 through its splendid unfolding in the poetry 
 of Hilary of Poictiers, Ambrose of Milan, and 
 
102 The Unveiling of the Father 
 
 Gregory the Great, to its sweet culmination in 
 the two Bernards, him of Clairvaux and him of 
 Cluny, repeats the same burden : 
 
 " O Jesus, Thou the glory art 
 Of angel worlds above ; 
 Thy name is music to my heart, 
 Enchanting it with love." 
 
 In every land and language, in German, in 
 French, in English, the most ^^^'^cious and 
 potent melodies of the Church are fragrant with 
 the name of Christ. 
 The testi- Xhe early liturgies bear the same testimony 
 
 early litur- ^^ ^he pre-eminence of the Lord Jesus in the 
 fi'ies- doxologies and supplications of Christian faith. 
 
 The Apostolical Constitutions,^ the liturgy of 
 St. James,2 tlie liturgy of St. Mark,^ the liturgy 
 of St. Adgeus and St. Maris,^ unquestionably 
 preserve the spirit of the early Christian wor- 
 ship ; and they all are witnesses to the fact that 
 the Christians prayed directly to Christ. In- 
 deed, it lies upon the very surface of history 
 that the growth of Christianity, as manifested 
 
 1 Apost. Const., Book VIII., chap, vii, 
 
 2 The Divine Liturgy of St. James, ill. : " Sovereign 
 Lord Jesus Christ, O Word of God," etc. 
 
 3 The Divine Liturgy of the Holy Apostle and Evangelist 
 Mark, v., xxii., etc. 
 
 * Liturgy of the Blessed Apostles, composed by St. Adoius 
 and St. Maris, xiv. 
 
The Unveiling of the Father- 103 
 
 in a spreading worship, was not simply the in- 
 crease of those who were willing to adore God 
 on the authority of Christ. It Avas distinctly 
 and essentially the diffusion of an iuAvard force 
 which impelled men to blend the name of Christ 
 with the name of God in their prayers, and to 
 worship the Son with the Father. The beauti- 
 ful Prayer of St. Chrysostom, which closes the 
 Litany and the Morning and Evening Prayers 
 of the Protestant Episcopal Church, is addressed 
 to Christ, " who dost promise that when two or 
 three are gathered together in Thy name. Thou 
 wilt grant their requests."^ There is not in 
 the world to-day a single great liturgy, Greek, 
 Roman, Armenian, French, German, Scotch, or 
 English, which does not contain ascriptions of 
 divine glory, and petitions for divine grace, 
 addressed to Jesus Christ. 
 
 Heathen writers of very early date assure us The testi- 
 that this was the practice of Christians from j^Qf^then ^^ 
 the beginning. The younger Pliny reported 
 to the Emperor Trajan that the people called 
 Christians were accustomed to assemble before 
 daybreak and "sing a hymn of praise respon- 
 sively to Christ, as it were to God."^ In the 
 
 1 St. Matt, xviii. 20. 
 
 2 A.D. 112. See the chapter on "Pliny's Report and 
 Trajan's Rescript " in Ramsay, The Church in the Boman 
 Empire (New York, Putnam, 1893), pp. 196 ff. 
 
Christians 
 despised for 
 worshipping 
 
 104 The Unveiling of the Father 
 
 public trials that followed there was never any 
 denial of this statement. It was admitted alike 
 by those who apostatized under the pressure of 
 persecution and by those who remained faithful 
 to the name of Christ. The Emperor Hadrian 
 wrote to Servian that of the population of Alex- 
 andria " some worshipped Serapis, and others 
 Christ." Lucian, the pagan satirist, says in 
 his biography of Peregrinus Proteus : " The 
 Christians are still worshipping that great man 
 who was crucified in Palestine."^ 
 
 In all the apologies for the Christian religion 
 which were put forth during the persecutions 
 Christ. under Hadrian, and his successors Antoninus 
 
 Pius and Marcus Aurelius, there was no at- 
 tempt to refute the universal charge that the 
 Christians worshipped Christ. ^ As if to con- 
 firm this evidence by one of those indications 
 which are all the more significant because they 
 are so slight and so clearly unpremeditated, 
 there still exists a rude caricature, scratched 
 by some careless hand upon the walls of the 
 
 1 Luciani Samosatensis Opera. (Ed. Leipsic, 1829), Tomiis 
 iv., p. 17o. 
 
 2 The First Apology of Justin Martyr., chap. xiii. : " Our 
 teaclier of these things is Jesus Christ ; and that we reason- 
 ably worship Him, having learned that He is the Son of the 
 true God Himself, and holding Him in the second place, and 
 the prophetic Spirit in the third, we will prove." 
 
The Unveiling of the Father 105 
 
 Palatine Palace in Rome not later than the 
 beginning of the third century, representing a 
 human figure with an ass's head hanging upon 
 a cross, while a man stands before it in the 
 attitude of worship. Underneath is this ill- 
 spelled inscription, — 
 
 " Alexamenos adore his God." ^ 
 Thus the songs and prayers of believers, the 
 accusations of persecutors, the sneers of scep- 
 tics, and the coarse jests of mockers all join 
 in proving beyond a doubt that the primitive 
 Christians paid divine honour to the Lord 
 Jesus. I do not see how any man can be in 
 touch with Christianity as a living form of 
 worship in the world, unless he knows the 
 reality and appreciates the force of this un- 
 questionable fact. 
 
 Ill 
 
 Nor will it be possible to understand the 
 intellectual and moral teachings of the Chris- 
 tian religion, as they are recorded in the New 
 Testament, unless we put ourselves at the focal 
 point from which, as a matter of history, these 
 teachings were first conceived and then un- 
 
 1 Das Spott- Crucifix der Bomischon Kaiser FaV'tste, Fer- 
 dinand Becker (Gera, 1876). Das Spott-Grucifix vom Pala- 
 tini Franz Xaver Kraus (Freiburg-, 1872). 
 
 Christ loas 
 a neiv 
 theology. 
 
106 The Unveiling of the Father 
 
 folded. This point was the vision of an un- 
 veiling of the being and mind of God in 
 Christ. 1 It was not merely that Jesns said 
 certain things about God which men had not 
 known, or had forgotten. It was that they 
 saw in the coming of Christ a personal revela- 
 tion of the Divine Being. And this revelation 
 touched and transformed every possible sphere 
 of thought and feeling in regard to the prob- 
 lems of religion. The personality of God was 
 made distinct and luminous, not only by the 
 recognition of an eternal Fatherhood in His 
 nature, but by the light of the knowledge of 
 His glory shining in the face of a person. ^ 
 The righteousness of God was disclosed in a 
 new aspect by the thought that He had sent 
 His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and 
 for sin to condemn sin in the flesh.^ The good- 
 ness of God was confirmed and made sufficient 
 for all possible human needs by the conviction 
 that He who spared not His own Son, but freely 
 delivered Him up for us all, would also with 
 Him freely give us all things.* The saving 
 will and power of God were apprehended 
 through the vision of Him in Clirist reconcil- 
 ing the world to Himself.^ The everlasting 
 
 1 See Appendix, note 27. ^ 2 Cor. iv. 6. 
 
 3 Rom. viii. o. * Kom. viii. 32. ^ 2 Cor. v. 19. 
 
The Unveiliiig of the Father 107 
 
 and inseparable love of God became the sure 
 ground of hope only when it was seen em- 
 bodied in Christ Jesus our Lord.^ The true 
 meaning of filial obedience to God and of 
 union with God was interpreted in the light 
 of conformity to the image of His Son.- And 
 the immense significance of immortality was 
 comprehended in the possession of a life hid 
 with Christ in God.^ 
 
 Now the window through which men caught Godivas 
 sight of these truths was, and could have been, (j^^^^igf^ 
 nothing else than faith in a real incarnation 
 of God in Christ. The personal, moral, sym- 
 pathetic view of God which distinguished the 
 early Church was seen only through that open- 
 ing.^ She saw the Divine Being beaming with 
 a new radiance, she saw the wide landscape of 
 human duty and destiny illuminated and trans- 
 figured, she saw a new heaven and a new earth, 
 when she saw in Christ all the fulness of the 
 Godhead dwelling bodily.^ And it was in the 
 
 1 Rom. viii. 39. 2 Rom. viii. 29. ^ Col. iii. 3. 
 
 * First Epistle of St. Clement, chap, xxxvi. : "By Him 
 we look up to tlie heights of heaven. By Him we beliold, 
 as in a glass, His immaculate and most excellent visage. By 
 Him are the eyes of our heart opened. By Him our foolish 
 and darkened understanding blossoms up anew towards the 
 light." Bp. Lightfoot's Edition. (Macmillan, 1890.) 
 
 ^ See appendix, note 28. 
 
Christian 
 doctrine 
 grew around 
 
 108 The Unveiling of the Father 
 
 strength and enthusiasm of this vision, that she 
 concentrated all her moral and intellectual en- 
 ergies on the one point of keeping that window 
 open, and maintaining against direct assault 
 and secret dissolution the real and personal 
 Deity of Christ. 
 
 IV 
 
 I am careful to put the statement in this 
 form because I believe that it alone corresponds 
 the Deity of with the facts, and because it is only by get- 
 
 (Jhrist. . . -. . , . . . , 
 
 tmg our mnids nito this position that we can 
 hope to understand the course, the meaning, 
 and the force of Christian doctrme. The early 
 Christians looked at God through Christ : they 
 did not look at Christ through a preconceived 
 idea and a logical definition of God. The true 
 development of theology, to put the matter 
 plainly, was not abstract, it was personal 
 and practical. The doctrine of the Trinity 
 came into being to meet an imperious neces- 
 sity.^ That necessity was the defence of the 
 actual worship of Christ, the actual trust in 
 Christ as the Unveiler of the Father, which 
 already existed at the heart of Christianity. 
 It was recognized instinctively that the loss 
 of tliis trust, the silencing of this worship, 
 1 See Appendix, note 29. 
 
The Unveiling of the Father 109 
 
 meant the death of Christianity by heart-fail- 
 ure. Every speculation which threatened this 
 result, every theory of human nature or of 
 divine nature which seemed to sejjarate the 
 personality of Christ from the personality of 
 God, was regarded by the Church as dangerous 
 and hostile. Every attempted statement of 
 theological dogma which appeared to obscure 
 or to imperil the reality and the eternal valid- 
 ity of the unveiling of the Father in the Son, 
 was resented, and a counter statement of theo- 
 logical dogma was framed to meet it. This 
 was the intellectual conflict of Christianity in 
 the first centuries : a struggle for life centring 
 about the actual Deity of Christ. 
 
 As we trace the progress of this conflict, The conflict 
 
 .,..,., , with heresy 
 
 its Vital importance emerges more and more 
 
 clearly. Often, I suppose, we cannot help feel- 
 ing a sense of sympathy with the earnest pur- 
 pose and the personal character of those men 
 who were called heretics. Often we are con- 
 scious of a certain distrust for the meta- 
 physical and exegetical arguments, and of a 
 grave repugnance for the physical and politi- 
 cal methods, which were used by the orthodox 
 to enforce their definitions. Athanasius was 
 not an altogether lovely person. Some of the 
 early Church Councils Avere almost as disor- 
 
110 
 
 The Unveiling of the Father 
 
 The Palla- 
 dium of 
 Christian- 
 ity. 
 
 derly and as cruel as some of tlie regiments 
 that fought in the war to defend the American 
 Union and free the slave. But the question is 
 not one of the manner of defence or attack. It 
 is a question of the reality and significance of 
 the cause attacked and defended. And here we 
 see that Athanasius with all his faults was on 
 the right side, and Arius with all his virtues 
 was on the wrong side. Through all the con- 
 fusion of metaphysical dispute about the exact 
 meaning of substance and subsistence, nature 
 and personality, ideal existence and real exist- 
 ence, — terms which, as I conceive them, must 
 change their significance as the methods of 
 human philosophy change, and must always 
 represent imperfectly a mystery which is for 
 us unsearchable and indefinable, — through all 
 this confusion one fact shines out clear and dis- 
 tinct. The unveiling of the Father in Christ 
 was, and continued to be, and still is, the 
 Palladium of Christianity. All who have sur- 
 rendered it, for whatever reason, have been 
 dispersed and scattered. All who have de- 
 fended it, in whatever method, have been held 
 fast in the unity of the faith and of the know- 
 ledge of the Son of God.^ 
 
 Eph. iv. 13. 
 
The doc- 
 trine of the 
 Trinity con 
 
 The Unveiling of the Father 111 
 
 This point of view must condition the atti- 
 tude of our minds towards the doctrine of the 
 Trinity. No Christian man can be hostile or stmcted to 
 
 . defend t/ie 
 
 indifferent to it when he remembers its history, jj^ny ^j 
 It may liave been too much elaborated by minds C*^*^^*^- 
 over-curious in metaphysical distinctions. It 
 may have been put in a position of undue pre- 
 eminence by theologians whose energies were 
 all absorbed in its construction and in the con- 
 templation of the work of their own reason in 
 the service of Christianity. But in spite of all 
 excesses and errors, it stands as an enduring 
 monument of the loyalty of the faith to its cen- 
 tral conviction. In all its forms, from the 
 sharply tri-personal Trinity of Athanasius, to 
 the essentially tri-modal Trinity of Augustine, 
 the great service which it has rendered is not 
 abstract nor philosophical. It is practical. 
 It has protected the conviction that the real 
 nature of God is revealed in Christ ; it has jus- 
 tified the consciousness that the Spirit of Christ, 
 animating the Christian life, is the Spirit of 
 God ; it has preserved the sense of real com- 
 munion with God in Christ which is the nervo 
 of Christian worship. 
 
 And yet the doctrine of the Trinity is not the 
 gospel, nor is it the foundation of the gospel. 
 It cannot be preached as a saving message to the 
 
112 
 
 The Unveiling of the Father 
 
 The doc- souls of men, except in that form in which we find 
 Trinihi ^ ^^ ^^^ Phillips Brooks' noble Sermon for Trinity 
 subordinate Sunday^ and Dr. George A. Gordon's powerful 
 pel. ^ ^^^' ^^iscourse on The Trinity the Ground of Humanity. 
 It is the effort to apprehend a relation of the 
 Being of God to the conscious experience of 
 man ; a truth exhibited in the course of revela- 
 tion and recognized in its mysterious unfolding 
 both before and after all efforts to symbolize 
 it in theological language ; in brief, it is the 
 reaching out of the human mind, conscious of 
 its limitations and conditions, towards a vision 
 and worship of the Father in the Son through 
 the Spirit. The doctrine of the Trinity is not 
 the Palladium. It is the defence. I will con- 
 fess that in its broad outlines it seems to me 
 necessary and satisfactory. I will confess that 
 no other answer to the profound questions 
 which inevitably arise out of the contact be- 
 tween the idea of God, and the experience of 
 real life in all its manifoldness, appears to me 
 half so reasonable or complete as that which 
 asserts that '•'- the various fundamental forms of 
 society on the earth, the essential relationships 
 of humanity, have their Archetype, their Eter- 
 nal Pattern and Causal Source, in the nature of 
 the Infinite."^ I will confess that the form of 
 1 Gordon, The Christ of To-day, p. 101. 
 
The Unveiling of the Father' 113 
 
 this answer wliicli contemplates tlie existence 
 of these eternal relationships in the Divine 
 nature as most clearly and positively personal, 
 is more conclusive to my mind than any other. 
 But if other men think otherwise on this point, 
 we are not therefore divided from each other, 
 or from the Christian faith. The question is 
 one of metaphysics. It is not a question of re- 
 ligion. All modes of defining the Trinity as a 
 doctrine must be kept subordinate to the pur- 
 pose for which it exists. All attempts to ex- 
 press it are valuable only in so far as they help 
 us to keep in view the unveiling of the Divine 
 nature which centres in Him Avho was mani- 
 fested in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen 
 of angels, preached among the nations, believed 
 on in the world, received up in glory. ^ 
 
 Now wherein is a message like this, the gos- The 
 pel of a personal unveiling of God in the per- 
 
 of the 
 Incaimation 
 
 son of Christ, adapted to the needs of the adapted to 
 present age? ^^"'^ «^^- 
 
 1. It seems to me first of all that the course 
 of modern thought has prepared the way for it 
 by destroying the a priori objections to the In- 
 1 1 Tim. iii. 16. 
 
114 The Unveiling of the Father 
 
 Philosophy carnation. Shallow agnosticism makes two as- 
 
 has cleared . , . , ^ t ^ x, 
 
 the way for sumptions whicli are contraciictory. It assumes 
 »^- that man is unable to attain to the knoAvlecIge 
 
 of God ; and that it is impossible for God to 
 reveal Himself to man. But if we cannot 
 knoAv Him, how can we know that He cannot 
 reveal Himself? This Avould be in effect the 
 most intimate kind of knowledge. To take it 
 for granted that an Incarnation of God is im- 
 possible or incredible is to profess a most per- 
 fect and exclusive understanding of the Divine 
 nature. "At one time," says Mr. Romanes, 
 " it seemed to me impossible that any proposi- 
 tion, verbally intelligible as such, could be 
 more violently absurd than that of the Incarna- 
 tion. Now I see that this standpoint is wholly 
 irrational. . . . ' But the Incarnation is op- 
 posed to common sense.' No doubt : utterly 
 so ; but so it ought to be if true. Common 
 sense is merely a rough register of common 
 experience. But the Incarnation, if it ever 
 took place, whatever else it may have been, 
 was not a common event. 'But it is deroga- 
 tory to God to become man.' How do you 
 know? Besides, Christ was not an ordinary 
 man. Both negative criticism and the positive 
 effects of His life prove this ; while if we for a 
 moment adopt the Christian point of view for 
 
The Unveiling of the Father 115 
 
 the sake of argument, tlie wliole raisoji d'etre 
 of mankind is bound up in Him. Lastly, there 
 are considerations per contra^ rendering an In- 
 carnation antecedently probable."^ 
 
 2. Now these considerations to which Ro- 
 manes alludes are not foreign to the intellect- 
 ual atmospliere of our age ; tliey are native to 
 it ; they are in fact the offspring of the times, 
 born of tlie spirit Avhich now leads the best 
 thoughts of men. 
 
 The whole doctrine of development, as it is Evolution 
 conceived by the deepest and clearest minds, ^o^oarcZsi; 
 looks forward to the discovery of an Incarna- 
 tion which shall be at once the crown and the 
 completion of the process of natural evolution. 
 If nature is an orderly and progressive mani- 
 festation of an Unseen Power ; if each succes- 
 sive step in this manifestation realizes and 
 exhibits something higher and more perfect, 
 to which all that has gone before has pointed, 
 and in which the potentialities of all previous 
 developments are not only summed up, but 
 raised to a new power ; if the mechanical struct- 
 ure of inorganic substances contains a proph- 
 ecy (only to be interpreted after the event) of 
 organic life, and organic life is a basis for in- 
 stinct and the elementary processes of intellect, 
 1 Thoughts on. Beligion, p. 186. 
 
116 
 
 The Unveiling of the Father 
 
 Personality 
 the final 
 revelation. 
 
 and the rude forms of thought and feeling in 
 the lower animals foreshadow the unfolding of 
 reflective reason and moral consciousness in 
 man, — then surely this reflective reason and 
 this moral consciousness, in themselves con- 
 fessedly imperfect, must be only the founda- 
 tion for a fuller and more i^erfect manifestation 
 of that Unseen Power out of whose depths 
 all preceding manifestations have come forth. 
 And if the universal verdict of human science 
 and philosophy is correct in assuming that the 
 lower must precede the higher, and that or- 
 ganic life is above inorganic life, and that rea- 
 son is above instinct, and that virtue is above 
 automatic action, then it is to be exj)ected that 
 the complete manifestation of that Unseen 
 Power which makes for Reason and Righteous- 
 ness will neither be omitted nor intruded before 
 its time. It cannot come too soon, without vi- 
 olating the order of evolution. It cannot fail 
 to come, without destroying the significance of 
 evolution. 
 
 But in what form can it come except in one 
 which at once sums up all that has gone before 
 it, and advances to a new level ? If the uni- 
 verse contains an unveiling of the might, and 
 wisdom, and reasonableness, and righteousness, 
 of its Primal Cause, then certainly it must con- 
 
The Unveiling of the Fathe?' 117 
 
 tain at last an unveiling of His personality. 
 This is the only thing that remains to be 
 added. This is the only thing that embraces 
 all the rest and raises it to a new power. The 
 highest category known to our minds is that 
 of self-conscious life. Without the conception 
 of a personal God, man's view of the universe 
 must remain forever incomplete, incoherent, 
 and unreasonable. Without the revelation of 
 a j)ersonal God, the process of evolution as the 
 unfolding of the real secret of the universe 
 must remain unfinished and futile. Philosophy 
 as well as religion pushes us forward to this 
 conclusion. Personality is the ultimate reality. 
 Personality must be the final revelation. But 
 a person can be unveiled only in a personal 
 form. Therefore all the presumptions of rea- 
 son are in favour of an Incarnation of the 
 Deity, not outside of nature, but in nature, to 
 consummate and crown that visible evolution 
 whereby the invisible things of Him from the 
 creation of the world are clearly seen.^ And 
 all the processes of intelligence are satisfied, 
 and rest and repose in the conviction that 
 the Word, which was in the beginning with 
 God and which was God and by whom all 
 things were made, finally became flesh and 
 dwelt among us, revealing His glory, the glory 
 1 See Appendix, note 30. 
 
 
118 
 
 The Unveiling of the Father 
 
 The gospel 
 of the 
 
 Incarnation 
 is histori- 
 cally con- 
 sistent. 
 
 as of the only-begotten of the Father, full of 
 grace and truth.^ 
 
 3. Moreover, this view of Christ is adapted 
 to the present age because it is historically con- 
 sistent. We have seen that it underlies the 
 very existence and growth of the Christian 
 Church. The testimony of eighteen centuries 
 to the impossibility of explaining the person- 
 ality of Christ on humanitarian grounds is in 
 itself an evidence of His divinity. 
 
 Lincoln was right when he said : " You can 
 fool some of the people all of the time, and all 
 of the people some of the time, but you can- 
 not fool all of the people all of the time." A 
 thousand attempts to account for the life of 
 Christ without admitting His divinity have 
 been made. Not one of them has succeeded 
 in winning the assent and approbation of any 
 great mass of men for any great length of 
 time. They have hardly survived the lives of 
 those who have invented them. Each new 
 naturalistic theory of Christ has discredited 
 and demolished its predecessors. And if any 
 one of them is alive and finds credence to-day, 
 it is only because it is the latest, and it is but 
 
 1 See Lyman Abbott, The Evolution of Christianity 
 (Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 189^), "Christ is not the prod- 
 uct of evolution, but the producer," pp. 240-242. 
 
The Unveiling of the Father 119 
 
 waiting for its successor (as the theory of 
 Socinus waited for the theory of Strauss, and 
 the theory of Strauss for the theory of Renan) 
 to be its judge and destroyer. / 
 
 Meantime historic Christianity, which be- The imprcj- 
 hokls God incarnate in Christ, stands as a rock of ChHs- 
 around which the tides of opinion ebb and flow, tianity. 
 The Church has changed in some things, but 
 not in this. It has modified, enlarged, dimin- 
 ished, or abandoned some articles of faith, but 
 not this. If it be an error, it is such an error 
 as the world has never seen anywhere else ; 
 for it has not only stood firm through the 
 fiercest and most persistent storm of criticism 
 that has ever been directed against any human 
 opinion, but it has also been the foundation of 
 the strongest and saintliest lives that humanity 
 has ever known. If it be a truth, it must be 
 for every Christian preacher the central truth. 
 For it is certain that this age of ours, with 
 its ruthless critical spirit, with its keen histori- 
 cal sense, will never respect the intelligence, 
 though it may acknowledge the good inten- 
 tions, of a man who professes to speak in the 
 name of Cliristianity without proclaiming, as 
 the core of his message, the Divine Christ. 
 
 4. And this gospel meets the need of our 
 times because it is the satisfaction of humanity. 
 
The incar- 
 nation 
 satisfies the 
 human 
 heart. 
 
 120 The Unveiling of the Father 
 
 More urgent and painful even than the ques- 
 tions of the intellect in regard to the being and 
 nature of God, are the misgivings of the heart 
 in regard to His relations to us. If He is that 
 remote and inaccessible Sovereign 
 
 " Who sees with equal eyes, as Lord of all, 
 A hero perish or a sparrow fall," 
 
 what possible answer can we find in Him to 
 the longings and desires of our souls for a 
 Divine love ? what possible support can we find 
 in Him for our struggles against outward 
 temptation and indwelling evil ? what possible 
 sympathy can we find in Him for our hopes 
 and aspirations and upward strivings, out of 
 the quicksands of heredity and environment, 
 towards liberty and light ? The religion of 
 the Incarnation is the only one that brings us 
 near to Him, assures us of our kinship with 
 Him, and of His infinite, practical, helpful love 
 for us. This faith alone bridges the chasm 
 that divides the eternal self-existent Spirit 
 from our finite, despondent, earthbound souls. 
 This faith alone gives us any knowledge of the 
 things that we most need to know about Him. 
 Deism is like a message written in an inscruta- 
 ble hieroglyph which conveys no clear meaning 
 to the mind. Theism is like a message which 
 is intelligible to the intellect, but unsatisfac- 
 
The Unveiling of the Father 121 
 
 tory to tlie heart, because it has no personal 
 address and no signature. Christianity is a per- 
 sonal message, signed by the hand of a Father, 
 and conveyed to us by the hand of the Son.^ 
 
 The comparison is imperfect. It falls far 
 short of the truth. In Christianity the mes- 
 senger is the message. The love which sent 
 and the love which delivered it are the same. 
 Christ is Immanuel, God with us. The gospel 
 of the Incarnation does not profess to remove 
 all intellectual perplexities in regard to the 
 existence of God and our own souls. It pro- 
 fesses simply to establish such a conscious re- 
 lation between our souls and God that our 
 ethical needs shall be satisfied at once ; and 
 thus it shall be infinitely easier, either to dis- 
 solve, or to endure, our intellectual perplexi- 
 ties. This relation is possible only in Christ. 
 And it is possible in Him only when we receive 
 Him as the unveiling of the Father. Tliis re- 
 quires an act of faith. But it is a faith which 
 is simpler in its form, more natural in its 
 method, and more profound in its spiritual re- 
 sults than any other. For in the last analysis 
 it is just an act of personal confidence in a 
 person. And this does not demand perfect 
 knowledge, but absolute trust. 
 1 See Appendix, note 31. 
 
 Christ is 
 God with 
 us. 
 
122 The Unveiling of the Father 
 
 The Deity of To imagine that we can adapt our preaching 
 
 Christ is the . ,-, . j' i i j_ i i • t 
 
 strength of ^^ ^^^^^ ^S® ^^ cloubt by weakennig, concealing, 
 our gospel, or abandoning the truth of the Deity of Christ 
 is to mistake the great need of our times. It 
 is to seek to commend our gospel by taking 
 away from it the chief thing that men really 
 want, — an assurance of sympathy and kinship 
 with God. " One of the great marks of the 
 youth of to-day," says Ernest Lavisse, — "I 
 speak of thinking youth, — is a longing for the 
 Divine." 1 This longing is to be met not by 
 slighting, but by emphasizing, not by clouding, 
 but by clarifying, not by withdrawing, but by 
 advancing, the true Deity of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ. Let us take up the words of the ancient 
 creed : " We believe in one Lord Jesus Christy 
 the Son of God^ only -begotten of the Father^ that 
 is of the substa7ice of the Father, God of God, 
 Light of Light, very God of God, begotten, not 
 made, being of one substance with the Father: 
 by Whom all things were made which are in 
 heaven and earth: Who, for us men and for our 
 salvation, came doiV7i, and was incarnate, and was 
 made man, and suffered, and rose the third day, 
 and ascended into the heavens, and shall come 
 to judge the quick and the dead.''' ^ 
 
 1 Ernest Lavisse, La Generation de 1890. 
 
 2 Symbolum Nicoenum, The Creeds of Christendom., Vol. 
 ii. (Harpers, 1882). 
 
IV 
 
 THE HUMAN LIFE OF GOD 
 
" Behold Him now where He comes ! 
 
 Not the Christ of our subtle creeds, 
 
 But the light of our hearts, of our homes, 
 
 Of our hopes, our prayers, our needs ; 
 
 The brother of want and blame, 
 
 The lover of women and men. 
 
 With a love that puts to shame 
 
 All passions of mortal ken. 
 
 ****** 
 " Ah no, thou life of the heart. 
 
 Never shalt thou depart ! 
 
 Not till the leaven of God 
 
 Shall lighten each human clod; 
 
 Not till the world shall climb 
 
 To thy height serene, sublime, 
 
 Shall the Christ who enters our door 
 
 Pass to return no more." 
 
 — Richard Watson Gilder, 
 
 The Passing of Christ. 
 
w 
 
 THE HUMAN LIFE OF GOD 
 Nearly fifty years ago, Horace Bushnell, ^ff^^at 
 
 • 1 f 1 • • 1 • truth in 
 
 the most mystical oi logicians, or the most logi- eclipse. 
 cal of mystics, delivered before Yale University 
 a magnificent discourse upon The Divinity of 
 Christ. In that fine work of genius, wrought 
 out of darkness and light, mystery and clear- 
 ness, like an intricate carving of ebony and 
 gold, I find these words: "Christ is in such 
 a sense God, or God manifested, that the un- 
 known term of His nature, that which we are 
 most in doubt of, and about which we are least 
 capable of any positive affirmation, is the 
 human." ^ 
 
 This sentence, it seems to me, is not of light, 
 but of darkness. It does not represent that 
 illuminating and harmonious kind of truth 
 which comes directly from the divine revelation 
 of Christ. It belongs rather to that obscured 
 
 1 Horace Bushnell, God in Christ (New York, Scribners, 
 1887), p. 123. 
 
 125 
 
126 
 
 The Human Life of Grod 
 
 Theology 
 has lost 
 sight of 
 Christ's 
 humanitxj. 
 
 and discordant manner of presenting truth 
 which is the consequence of studying it too 
 much at second-hand and too little at first- 
 hand, too much in the speculations and reason- 
 ings of men and too little in the facts of life 
 wherein it was first manifested. Whatever 
 may be said of this sentence as a statement of 
 the result of dogmatic theology, — and in this 
 sense I, for one, do not question its accuracy, 
 — when we consider its plain meaning as an 
 expression of Christian experience and faith, 
 one thing is clear : It is utterly out of touch 
 with the experience and faith of the first dis- 
 ciples. It is in sharp and striking discord 
 with the consciousness of the primitive Church. 
 For if there is anything in regard to which the 
 New Testament makes positive and undoubting 
 affirmation, it is the complete, genuine, and 
 veritable humanity of Christ. If there is any 
 fact which stands out luminous and distinct 
 in the experience of the early Christians, it is 
 that tliey saw in Christ, not merely a myste- 
 rious manifestation of the Divine in a form cal- 
 culated to beget new doubts, and under con- 
 ditions which must remain inscrutable and 
 incomprehensible, but something utterly differ- 
 ent. They saw the mystery reduced to terms 
 of simplicity, the revelation levelled to the 
 
The Human Life of G-od 127 
 
 direct apprehension of man, the unveiling of 
 the Father under conditions which were so 
 familiar that they dissolved doubts and diffi- 
 culties. They saw in Christ the human life 
 of God. 
 
 The object of this lecture is, first, to trace How shall 
 
 , . r, . T . 1 • 1 i_ 1 • • £ the vision ha 
 
 very briefly the way m which this view o± restored? 
 Christ has been beclouded so that His human- 
 ity has appeared doubtful and less capable of 
 positive affirmation ; second, to show how the 
 primitive view of His person and life may be, 
 and in the history of Christian faith often has 
 been, recovered and restored to its pristine 
 brilliancy and beauty ; and third, to try to 
 express, though but imperfectly, the meaning 
 and importance of this view for the present 
 age. 
 
 Definition is dangerous. Necessary it may Obscuration 
 be ; useful it undoubtedly is ; but our recogni- yj^^^^ "* 
 tion of these qualities ought not to make us 
 forget or deny the peril which the process cer- 
 tainly involves. And this is the nature of the 
 danger : the definition has an inherent ten- , 
 dency to substitute itself for the thing defined. | 
 The terms in which a fact is expressed creep 
 into the place of the fact itself. The reality is 
 
128 
 
 The Human Life of God 
 
 An illustra- 
 tion from 
 the history 
 of Art. 
 
 removed insensibly to a remote distance behind 
 the verbal symbols which represent it. The 
 way of access to it is blocked, and its influ- 
 ence is restricted by the forms of expression 
 invented to define it. 
 
 I do not know where we can find a more vivid 
 illustration of this process than that which is 
 given, in many ways, in the history of art. The 
 first effort of the artist is to represent something 
 that he has seen or imagined. Out of this 
 effort and the work which it produces, grow 
 certain methods and habits of representing 
 landscape and architecture and the human 
 figure. Out of these habits grow rules and 
 formulas, not only for the hand but also for the 
 eye. On these formulas schools are founded. 
 In these schools the example of masters comes 
 to have an authority which overshadoAvs and 
 limits the vision of facts as well as the repre- 
 sentation of them.i The Japanese artists, of 
 certain schools, actually reproduce that infan- 
 tile condition of sight in which all things 
 appear flat, in a single j^lane without perspec- 
 tive. The Giotteschi of Italy carried their 
 disregard of anatomy to such a point that 
 joints and articulations vanished from the 
 human figure. 
 
 1 See Appendix, note 32. 
 
The Human Life of God 129 
 
 Now this same process of limitation by for- Represei 
 miilas may be observed, on the ideal side, in (jhrist. 
 the course of religious art. The first pictures 
 of Christ, traced in colour upon the walls of 
 the Catacombs, or carved in stone upon the sar- 
 cophagi of the Christian dead, do not give us 
 indeed the very earliest conception of Him ; for 
 the Christian art of the first two centuries, if it 
 ever existed, has long since perished. But that 
 which remains, dating from the third and fourth 
 centuries, bears witness to an idea of the Christ 
 which was simple and natural and humane. 
 He appears as a figure of youthful beauty and 
 graciousness ; the good Shepherd bearing a 
 lamb upon His shoulders ; the true Orpheus 
 drawing all creatures and souls by the charm 
 of His amiable music. ^ These are only sym- 
 bolic representations, yet they evidence a con- 
 ception of Him which was still in touch with 
 the facts. A little later we find an effort to 
 conceive and depict Him with more realism. 
 His face appears in pictures which resemble 
 the description given in the spurious Epistle 
 of Lentulus : " A man of dignified presence, 
 with dark hair parted in the middle and 
 flowing down, after the custom of the Naza- 
 
 1 So in the paintings from the Catacombs of S. Agnese 
 and S. Callisto. 
 
130 
 
 The Human Life of Crod 
 
 Tradition 
 petrifies 
 Christian 
 Art. 
 
 renes, over both shoulders ; His brow clear 
 and pure ; His unfurrowed face of pleasant 
 aspect and medium complexion ; His mouth 
 and nose faultless ; His short, light beard 
 parted in the middle ; His eyes bright and 
 lustrous."^ 
 
 But when we pass on to the creations of so- 
 called Byzantine art, we find ourselves face to 
 face with an utterly different view of the Christ. 
 His countenance now stares out in glittering 
 mosaic from the walls of great churches, huge, 
 dark, threatening, a dreadful and forbidding 
 face. The fixed and formal lines are repeated 
 and deepened by artist after artist. Every feat- 
 ure of naturalness is obliterated ; every feature 
 that seemed to express awfulness is exagger- 
 ated and emphasized. The wide-set eyes, the 
 long narrow countenance, the stern, inflexible 
 mouth, — in this ocular definition the man 
 Christ Jesus has vanished, and we see only the 
 immense, immutable, and terrible Pantokrator, 
 who cannot be touched with the feeling of our 
 infirmities. 2 
 
 When we turn to the intellectual life of the 
 Church out of which this type of art grew, we 
 
 1 This is the imago Christi which we see in the painting 
 from the Catacomb of S. Ponziano. 
 
 2 See the mosaic of Christ in the Church of St. Paul out- 
 side tlie walls, near Rome. 
 
The Human Life of God 131 
 
 see there the process explained. The early Dogmas 
 Greek Fathers, like Trenteus, went directly to ^ -^^ ^^ 
 the Holy Scriptures for their view of the per- Christ. 
 son of Christ, and frankly accepted all the 
 features of the living, lovely portrait there dis- 
 closed. ^ They recognized without reserve the 
 reality of Christ's human growth in wisdom and 
 stature and in favour with God and men ; the 
 actual limitations of Christ's human knowledge 
 as expressed in the questions that He asked and 
 in His profession of ignorance in regard to the 
 time of His second advent ; the intimacy of His 
 sympathy with us in temptation, suffering, and 
 death. But with the development of theological 
 definition this direct view of Christ was modified, 
 obscured, and at last totally eclipsed. Instead of 
 looking at God through His revelation in Christ, 
 the Fathers began to look at Christ through a 
 more and more abstract, precise, and inflexible 
 statement of the metaphysical idea of God. It 
 became necessary to harmonize the Scripture 
 record of the life of Jesus with the theories of 
 the divine nature set forth in the decrees of 
 councils and defined with amazing particularity 
 in the writings of theologians. In the effort to 
 accomplish this, two main lines of thought were 
 followed. One line abandoned the belief in 
 1 See Appendix, note 33, 
 
132 
 
 The Human Life of Grod 
 
 The hiding 
 of the face 
 of Jesus. 
 
 Bending the 
 Bible to Jit 
 definitions. 
 
 Christ's real and complete humanity, and re- 
 duced His human life to a tenuous and filmy 
 apparition. The other line distinguished be- 
 tween His humanity and His Divinity in such 
 a way as to divide Him into two halves, either 
 of which appears virtually complete without 
 the other, and both of which are united, not in 
 a single and sincere personality, but in an out- 
 ward manifestation and a concealed life, cover- 
 ing in some mysterious way a double centre of 
 existence. It is only fair to say that the ex- 
 treme results of these two lines of thought were 
 condemned by the Church in the heresies of 
 Doketism and ApoUinarianism, Eutychianism 
 and Nestorianism. But it is equally fair to say 
 that the influence of these theories was by no 
 means checked nor extirpated. They continued 
 to make themselves felt powerfully and perni- 
 ciously ; now in the direction of dissolving 
 the humanity of Christ into a mere cloud 
 enveloping His Deity ; and again in the 
 direction of dividing and destroying the 
 unity of His person in the definitions of a 
 dual nature. 
 
 It is not necessary, nor would it be possible, 
 for us to trace this pirocess in detail through all 
 its complexities and self-contradictions. It 
 will be enough to give two or three specimens 
 
The Human Life of God 133 
 
 of the kind of work to which it led in dealing 
 with two essential features of the picture of 
 Christ which is given to us in the Gospels : His 
 human limitation of knowledge, and His human 
 growth in wisdom, stature, and grace. Both 
 limitation and growth are unexempt conditions 
 of manhood. Both are unquestionably attrib- 
 uted to Clirist in the New Testament. Both 
 are explicitly denied by theologians. Ephrem 
 Syrus, commenting upon the Diatessaron of 
 Tatian, says : " Christ, though He knew the 
 moment of His advent, yet that they might not 
 ask Him any more about it, said, I know it not.^^ ^ 
 Chrysostom, in his explanation of St. Matthew 
 xxiv. 36, paraphrases Christ's words in this 
 extraordinary fashion : " For if thou seek after 
 the day and the hour thou shalt not hear them 
 of me, saith He ; but if of times and preludes, 
 I will tell thee all exactly. For that indeed 
 I am not ignorant of it^ I have shown by many 
 things. — I lead thee to the very vestibule ; 
 and if 1 do not open unto thee the doors, this 
 also I do for your good."^ John of Damascus, 
 defending the orthodox faith, declares that, 
 
 1 Evang. Concordant. Expos. (Auclier and Moesinger, 
 Venice, 1876), p. 16. 
 
 2 St. Chrysostom, Homilies on the Gospel of St. Matthew, 
 Ixxvii. 2. The Nicene Fathers (New York, Christian Litera- 
 ture Co., 1888), vol. X. 
 
134 The Human Life of God 
 
 ''Christ is said to advance in wisdom and 
 stature and grace, because He grows in fact in 
 stature, and through His growth in stature 
 brings out into exhibition the wisdom which 
 already existed in Him. . . . But those who 
 say that He really grew in wisdom and grace as 
 receiving increase in these, deny that the flesh 
 was united to the word from the first moment 
 of its existence." 1 Peter Lombard does not 
 explicitly adopt, but quotes with evident ap- 
 proval, the opinion that the person of the eter- 
 nal Word put on a human body and soul as a 
 robe, in order that He might appear suitably to 
 the eyes of mortals, yet in Himself He was not 
 changed by this incarnation, but remained one 
 and the same, immutable.^ 
 
 A very full and clear exhibition of the dark- 
 ness and unreality in which the patristic and 
 mediceval theologians involved the person of 
 Christ may be found in Professor A. B. Bruce's 
 great book on The Humiliation of Christ,^ and 
 in Canon Charles Gore's two admirable vol- 
 umes on The Incarnation^'^ from which I have 
 
 1 John Damascene, De Fide Orthod.y Lib. iii. chap. xxii. 
 
 2 Peter Lombard, Sentt., Book iii., Dist. vi. § 6. 
 
 3 Prof. Alexander Balmain Bruce, The Humiliation of 
 Christ (New York, Armstrongs, 1887). 
 
 4 Canon Charles Gore, The Incarnation of the Son of God, 
 Barapton Lectures, 1891 (New York, Scribners, 1891). Dis- 
 
The Human Life of Grod 135 
 
 taken some illustrations after verifying them. 
 Professor Bruce sums up the matter by saying : 
 " The effect, though not the design, of theories 
 of Christ's person has been to a large extent to 
 obscure some of these elementary truths, — 
 the unity of the person, or the reality of the 
 humanity, or the divinity dwelling within the 
 man, or the voluntariness and ethical value of 
 the state of the humiliation. That is, certain- 
 ties have been sacrificed for uncertainties, facts 
 for hypotheses, faith for speculation. "^ 
 
 Canon Gore, in his Bampton Lectures, ^-^^^na?!- 
 
 hood of 
 
 adroitly uses the Jesuit theologian De Lugo as jesus van- 
 a man of straw through whom he may safely ^^^^^^• 
 and vigorously attack the false conceptions of 
 Christ's person which are still current, and to a 
 considerable degree dominant, in dogmatic the- 
 ology. He says that De Lugo depicts a Christ 
 " who, if He was, as far as His body is con- 
 cerned, in a condition of growth, was, as re- 
 gards His soul and intellect, from the first 
 moment and throughout His life in full enjoy- 
 ment of the beatific vision. Externally a way- 
 farer, a viator, inwardly He was throughout 
 a eomprehensor, He had already attained. . . . 
 It is denied that He can be strictly called 
 
 sertations on Subjects connected with the Incarnation (New 
 York, Scribners, 1895). i The Humiliation of Christ, p. 192. 
 
136 The Human Life of God 
 
 ' the servant of God ' even as man, in spite of the 
 direct use of that expression in the Acts of the 
 Apostles. He is spoken of at the institution of 
 the Eucharist as offering sacrifice to His own 
 Godhead."! 
 Modern ex- Canon Gore condemns this picture by De 
 
 amples of . ., . t . 
 
 false Chris- -l^^go as in striking contradiction to that which 
 toiogy. ^j^e New Testament presents. But the point 
 
 which I wish to make clear and distinct, is that, 
 in spite of this contradiction, the picture has 
 not been frankly and finally discarded in Chris- 
 tian theology. It still exercises an obscuring 
 and perverting influence upon the vision of 
 Christ. It still produces, by imitation, repre- 
 sentations of Him in which definitions dominate 
 facts, and formulas hide or obliterate realities. 
 We do not need to go back to the seventeenth 
 century, nor abroad to the Jesuits, for .our ex- 
 amples. We may turn to Archdeacon Wilber- 
 force's book on The Incarnation^ and find him 
 representing the body of Christ as miraculous 
 in its freedom from sickness, its power over 
 animals, its exemption from the necessity of 
 death, and its inherent power of communicat- 
 ing life to others.^ In regard to the mind of 
 
 1 The Incarnation, p, 164 
 
 2 Archdeacon Wilberforce, The Doctrine of the Incarna- 
 tion (New York, Young, 1885), pp. 60-65. 
 
The Human Life of Qod 137 
 
 Christ, he says that " smce it would be impious 
 to suppose that our Lord had pretended an 
 ignorance which He did not experience, we 
 are led to the conclusion [astonishing conclu- 
 sion !] that what He partook, as man, was 
 not actual ignorance, but such deficiency in 
 the means of arriving at truth as belongs to 
 mankind."^ We may turn to the Dogmatic 
 Theology of Dr. W. G. T. Shedd and read: 
 "Jesus Christ as a theanthropic person was AdouhU 
 constituted of a divine nature and a human ^^^^ 
 nature. The divine nature had its own form 
 of experience, like the mind in an ordinary 
 human person ; and the human nature had its 
 own form of experience, like the body in a com- 
 mon man. The experiences of the divine nature 
 were as diverse from those of the human nature 
 as those of the human mind are from those of 
 the human body. Yet there was but one per- 
 son who was the subject-ego of both of these 
 experiences. At the very time when Christ 
 was conscious of weariness and thirst by the 
 well of Samaria, He also was conscious that He 
 was the eternal and only-begotten Son of God, 
 the second person in the Trinity. This is proved 
 by His words to the Samaritan woman : ' Who- 
 soever drinketh of the water that I shall give 
 
 1 IhiQl., p. 71. 
 
138 
 
 The Human Life of God 
 
 His man- 
 hood a 
 vesture. 
 
 him shall never thirst ; but the water that I 
 shall give him shall be in him a well of water 
 springing up into everlasting life. I that speak 
 unto thee am the Messiah. ' The first-mentioned 
 consciousness of fatigue and thirst came through 
 the human nature in His person ; the second- 
 mentioned consciousness of omnipotence and 
 supremacy came through the divine nature in 
 His person. If He liad not had a human nature, 
 He could not have had the former consciousness; 
 and if He had not had a divine nature. He could 
 not have had the latter. Because He had both 
 natures in one person, He could have both."^ 
 We may turn to Canon Liddon's magnificent 
 work on The Divinity of our Lord and find him 
 writing : " Christ's Manhood is not of Itself an 
 individual being ; It is not a seat and centre of 
 personality ; It has no conceivable existence 
 apart from the act whereby the Eternal Word 
 in becoming Incarnate called It into being and 
 made It His Own. It is a vesture which He has 
 folded around His person ; It is an instrument 
 through which He places Himself in contact with 
 men and whereby He acts upon humanity." ^ 
 
 1 W. G. T. Shedd, Dogmatic Theology (New York, Scrib- 
 ners, 1888), vol. ii., pp. 307, 308. 
 
 2 H. P. Liddon, The Divinity of our Lord and Saviour 
 Jesus Christ, Bampton Lectures, 1866 (London, Rivingtons, 
 11th edition, 1885), p. 202. 
 
The Human Life of Qod 139 
 
 And so, if we accept this picture of Christ, The human 
 the manhood of Jesus fades, retreats, grows ^^^^ 
 dim and shadowy. It wavers like a veil. It 
 dissolves like mist. It descends again mys- 
 terious and impenetrable, illusory and imj)er- 
 sonal, to envelop Him whom we love and adore 
 in its strange and unfamiliar folds. We grope 
 after Him, but we can touch nothing but the 
 hem of His mystic robe. We long for Him, 
 but He approaches us, and comes into contact 
 with us, only through an instrument. He is 
 not what He seems. The Son of God behind 
 that veil is beyond our reach. The Son of 
 man, whom human eyes beheld and human 
 hands touched, is not the real, living, veritable 
 Saviour, but only the form, the garment, of an 
 inscrutable life. And if, in our dire confusion, 
 our reasoning faith still succeeds in holding 
 fast to the Eternal Logos, our confiding faith is 
 maimed and robbed by the loss of that true, 
 near, personal, loving, sympathizing Jesus, who 
 was born of a woman, suffered under Pontius 
 Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried. He is 
 gone from us, as certainly as if the Pharisees 
 had spoken truth -when they said that His dis- 
 ciples came by night and stole Him away. The 
 thing of which we are most in doubt, and 
 about which we are least capable of any positive 
 
140 The Human Life of God 
 
 affirmation, is the humanity of Christ. We are 
 left with a perfectly orthodox doctrine of two 
 natures, but we no longer have a clear and 
 simple gospel of One Person to preach to the 
 doubting souls of men.^ 
 
 n 
 
 The cry of But the heart of Christendom has never 
 a human ^ rested content with this distant, vague, uncer- 
 Saviour. tain view of the real manhood of our Lord. 
 There has always been a protest against it. 
 There has always been an effort to escape from 
 it. 
 The icor- We can see a strange and indirect but 
 
 indubitable evidence of this deep inward dis- 
 satisfaction, in the rise and growth of an im- 
 passioned devotion to the human mother of 
 Jesus. The worship of the Virgin Mary was 
 a reprisal for the obscuration of the humanity 
 of her Son. In the thought of her true 
 womanly tenderness and affection, her real and 
 unquestionable sorrows, her simple and familiar 
 joys, her intimate, genuine, unfailing sympathy 
 with all that makes our mortal life a bitter, 
 blessed reality to us, the souls of the lowly and 
 the lonely found that peace and consolation 
 
 1 See Appendix, note 34. 
 
 ship of the 
 Virgin 
 
The Human Life of Grod 141 
 
 which they could no longer find in the con- 
 templation of the distant Second Person of the 
 Trinity through the telescope of theology. 
 That which Jesus Himself was to John and 
 Peter, to the household of Bethany, to the 
 penitent publican, and to the woman which 
 was a sinner, Mary became to the baffled and 
 confused faith of a later age, — an approachable 
 mediator of the divine mercy, a helper who 
 could really understand and feel the need of 
 those who cried for help, a warm and living 
 image of. the Eternal Sympathy in flesh and 
 blood. In the light of mediseval dogmatics 
 Mariolatry appears not without its justifica- 
 tion. And for my part, I should not wish to be 
 bound to the Christology of Peter Lombard 
 and Thomas Aquinas, without finding the com- 
 pensation which their followers found in per- 
 sonal devotion and confidential trust, flowing 
 instinctively and irresistibly towards the blessed 
 Virgin. 
 
 But, after all, this was only a substitute for ^^e search 
 the real thing. It gave to faith the image of 
 a lovely and adorable humanity in closest union 
 with God ; but it did not give back the old 
 vision of the human life of God. And so 
 through all the ages we see men turning, now 
 in solitary thought, now in great companies, to 
 
142 The Human Life of God 
 
 seek that vision. The renaissance of Christian 
 art, with its beautiful pictures of the infancy of 
 Jesus, with its piercing and pathetic representa- 
 tions of the sufferings of Jesus, bears witness 
 to the eagerness of that search. The revivals 
 of Christian life, seen in such diverse yet cog- 
 nate forms as the rise of the '' Poor Men of 
 Lyons" and the foundation of the ''Brother- 
 hood of St. Francis " are evidences of the same 
 movement back to Christ. Peter Waldo outside 
 of the Church, and Francis of Assisi within the 
 Church, were awakened by the same ^vision of 
 Jesus, " a man of sorrows and acquainted with 
 grief," and were inspired by the same desire to 
 make His real human life the pattern of all piety 
 Thespint and the example of all goodness. The Refor- 
 mation, which was at once and equally an intel- 
 lectual and a spiritual protest against the arro- 
 gance of current theology and the coldness of 
 religious life, supplies no better watchword to 
 express its great motive than the saying of 
 Erasmus : " I could wish that those frigid subt- 
 leties either were completely cut off, or were 
 not the only things that the theologians held as 
 certain, and that the Christ pure and simple might 
 he implanted deep luithin the minds of men.^^^ 
 
 1 Erasmus, quoted in Gore, Dissertations, etc., p. 180, 
 Epistle 207. 
 
 of the Refor- 
 mation, 
 
The Human Life of G-od 143 
 
 Modern Biblical scholarship, with its splendid 
 apparatus of linguistic and historical learning, 
 proceeding in part, at first, from a sceptical im- 
 pulse, has developed in our generation, either 
 through the conversion of sceptics in the process 
 of research, or through the awakening of be- 
 lievers to the necessities of their faith, into a 
 reverent and eager quest for the historic Christ, 
 the Jesus of the Gospels, the Lord of the primi- 
 tive Church, that we may see Him as the first 
 Christians saw Him, in the integrity of His per- 
 son and the sincerity of His life, and receive from ''^ack to 
 
 Christ I ' ' 
 
 Him what they received, — a faith that dissolved 
 doubts and an inspiration that conquered diffi- 
 culties. Back to the New Testament of our 
 Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, — back to the 
 facts that lie behind the definitions, back to 
 the Person who embodies the truth, back to the 
 record and reflection of that which the apostles 
 "heard, and saw with their eyes, and looked 
 upon, and their hands handled of the word of 
 life," — this, and this only, is the way that leads 
 us within sight of 
 
 " the heaven-drawn picture 
 Of Christ, the living Word." 
 
 Now it is a marvellous thing, and one for 
 which we can never be grateful enough, that 
 
144 
 
 The Human Life of God 
 
 The Bible 
 gives us a 
 Kinsman- 
 Redeemer. 
 
 The Christ 
 of the ■ 
 Gospels. 
 
 when we come to the New Testament in this 
 spirit, we find in it exactly what we need ; not an 
 abstract formuLa, not a collection of definitions, 
 but the graphic reflection of a Person seen 
 from a fourfold point of view, and the simple 
 record of manifold human experience under the 
 direct and dominant influence of that Person. 
 And the one fact that emerges clear and tri- 
 umphant from the reflection and the record, is 
 that the writers of the New Testament never 
 were in doubt of the human nature of Christ 
 and never hesitated to make the most positive 
 affirmations in regard to it. 
 
 The Christ of the Gosjjels is bone of our 
 bone, flesh of our flesh, mind of our mind, 
 heart of our heart. He is in subjection to 
 His parents as a child. He grows to man- 
 hood. His character is unfolded and perfected 
 by discipline. He labours for daily bread, and 
 prays for Divine grace. He hungers, and 
 thirsts, and sleeps, and rejoices, and weeps. 
 He is anointed with the Spirit for His minis- 
 try. He is tempted. He is lonely and dis- 
 appointed. He asks for information. He 
 confesses ignorance. He interprets the facts 
 of nature and life with a prophetic insight. 
 But He makes no new disclosure of the secrets 
 of omniscience. There is no hint nor indica- 
 
The Human Life of God 145 
 
 tion that He is leading a double life, reigning 
 consciously as God while He is suffering appar- 
 ently as man. His personality is simple and 
 indivisible. The glory of what He is and does, 
 lies not only in its perfection, but in the hard 
 conditions of its accomplishment. Superhuman 
 in His origin, as the only-begotten Son of God ; 
 superhuman in His office and work, as the re- 
 vealer of the Father and the redeemer of man- 
 kind ; in His earthly existence the Christ of the 
 Gospels enters without reserve and without de- 
 ception into all the conditions and limitations 
 which are necessary to give to the world, once 
 and forever, the human life of God.^ 
 
 When we turn to the Epistles to see how '^^^ Christ 
 this view of Christ was affected by the recog- Epistles. 
 nition of His divine glory and power as one 
 who had been raised to the right hand of God 
 and made head over all things to the Church, 
 two things strike us with tremendous force. 
 First, the identity of His person was not lost, 
 nor the continuity of His being broken : the 
 exalted Christ is none other than "this same 
 Jesus." 2 Second, the reality and absoluteness 
 of His humiliation are emphasized as the ground 
 and cause of His exaltation. 
 
 How vividly these two things come out, for 
 1 See Appendix, note 35. 2 ^cts i. 11. 
 
view. 
 
 146 The Human Life of God 
 
 St. PauVs example, in the writings of St. Paul. It has 
 been well said that " the Christ whom Paul had 
 seen was the risen Christ, and the conception 
 of Him in His glorified character is the one 
 which rules ]ns thoughts and forms the start- 
 ing-point of his teaching." ^ Corresponding to 
 this present glory, Paul assumes an eternally 
 pre-existent glory of Christ as the image of 
 the invisible God, the medium and end of crea- 
 tion. ^ Now it is of this Person, divinely glori- 
 ous in the past as the One who is before all 
 things and in whom all things consist,^ divinely 
 glorious in the present as the One who is far 
 above every name that is named, not only in 
 this world but in that which is to come,* — 
 it is of this Person that Paul writes, in words 
 so strong that they touch the very border of 
 the impossible : " For our sakes. He beggared 
 Himself that we through His beggary might 
 be enriched."^ And again: "He, existing in 
 the form of God, did not consider an equal 
 state with God a thing to be selfishly grasped 
 and held, but emptied Himself and took the 
 form of a slave, being made in the likeness of 
 man."^ These powerful expressions, "self- 
 
 1 Stevens, The Pauline Theologij, p. 206. 
 
 2 Col. i. 16. 3 Col. i. 17. 4 Eph. i. 21. 
 6 2 Cor. viii. 9. e piiQ. n. 6, 7. 
 
The Human Life of G-od 147 
 
 beggary," "self-emptying," seem to be directly 
 designed to break up the conventional moulds 
 in which dogmatic theology has attempted to 
 cast the truth and let it harden. They bring 
 back a vital warmth and motion into the facts 
 of the Incarnation. Once more it glows and 
 flows. Once more we see that it is not a mere 
 exhibition of being but a process of becoming. 
 The idea of self-beggary mightily overflows 
 the mere statement that a human nature was 
 added and united to the divine nature; for 
 that would have been no impoverishment but 
 an enrichment. 1 The idea of self -emptying The 
 shatters the narrow dogma that the Son of ^'^^^^^• 
 God suffered no change in Himself when He 
 became man. It was a change so absolute, so 
 immense, that it can only be compared with 
 the vicissitude from fulness to emptiness. He 
 laid aside the existence-form of God, in order 
 that He might take the existence-form of man. 
 Whatever right He had to an equal state of 
 glory with God, that right He did not cling 
 to, but surrendered, in order that He might 
 become a servant. And upon this real self- 
 emptying there followed a real self-humilia- 
 tion, wherein, being found in fashion as a man. 
 He became obedient unto death, even the death 
 1 See Appendix, note 36. 
 
148 
 
 The Human Life of God 
 
 The Epistle 
 of Christ's 
 brotherhood. 
 
 of the cross. ^ It was on account of this, — 
 and by " this " we must understand the entire 
 actual operation of the self-denying, self-hum- 
 bling, self-sacrificing mind of Christ, — it was 
 for this reason, St. Paul declares, that " God 
 highly exalted Him, and gave unto Him the 
 name which is above every name."^ And I 
 know not how to interpret such language 
 with any reality of intelligence, unless it 
 means that the present glory of the Son of 
 God is in some true sense the result of His 
 having become man and so fulfilled the will 
 of God. 
 
 This view, which St. Paul condenses into a 
 single pregnant "wherefore," is expanded in 
 the Epistle to the Hebrews. The object of 
 this Epistle is to show the superiority of the 
 priesthood and sacrifice of Christ, which are 
 substantial and enduring, to the priesthood and 
 sacrifice of the old dispensation, which were 
 shadowy and transient. But the method which 
 the writer follows is not to deny, but to assert 
 the verity of Christ's humanity. Without this 
 He could not be the true priest nor offer the 
 true sacrifice. ''In all things it behoved Him 
 to be made like unto His brethren. "^ '' For we 
 have not an high priest which cannot be touched 
 1 Phil. ii. 8. 2 Phil. ii. 9, 3 Heb. ii. 17. 
 
of conde- 
 scension. 
 
 The Human Life of God 149 
 
 with the feelmg of our infirmities : but was in 
 all points tempted like as we are, yet without 
 sin." 1 " Though He were a Son, yet learned 
 He obedience by the things which He suffered, 
 and being made perfect, He became the author 
 of eternal salvation unto all them that obey 
 Him."^ This complete incarnation, this thor- The gioi-y 
 ough trial under human conditions, this perfect 
 discipline of obedience through suffering, was a 
 humiliation. But it was in no sense a degrada- 
 tion. On the contrary, it was a crowning of 
 Christ with glory and honour in order that He 
 might taste death for every man. " For it be- 
 came Him, for whom are all things, and by 
 whom are all things, in bringing many sons to 
 glory, to make tlie captain of their salvation 
 perfect through suffering."^ If the Epistle to 
 the Hebrews teaches anything, it certainly 
 teaches this. The humanity of Jesus was not 
 the veiling but the unveiling of the divine 
 glory. The limitations, temptations, and suffer- 
 ings of manhood were the conditions under 
 which alone Christ could accomplish the great- 
 est work of the Deity, — the redemption of a 
 sinful race. The seat of the divine revelation 
 and the centre of the divine atonement was and 
 is the human life of God. 
 
 1 Heb. iv. 15. 2 Heb. v. 8, 9. 3 Heb. ii. 9, 10. 
 
150 
 
 The Human Life of Grod 
 
 III 
 
 A suminary 
 of conclu- 
 sions. 
 
 Current 
 theology 
 at fault. 
 
 Human 
 theories 
 not to be 
 insisted 
 upon. 
 
 Here, then, we may pause for a moment and 
 try to sum up the conclusions to which the New 
 Testament leads us in regard to the person of 
 Christ. 
 
 I am sincerely anxious not to be misunder- 
 stood. On the one hand, I would not conceal 
 for a moment my conviction that current theol- 
 ogy has failed, very often and very largely, to 
 do justice to the meaning of the Incarnation on 
 the human side, and that we must go back to 
 the image of Jesus Christ as it is reflected in the 
 Gospels to purify, and refresh, and simplify 
 our faith. We should not suffer any reverence 
 for ancient definitions of doctrine, however well 
 founded, nor any fear of incurring reproach and 
 mistrust as innovators, to deter us from that 
 necessary and loyal return to the reality of tlie 
 Person in whom our creed centres and on whom 
 it rests. To find Jesus anew, to see Him again, 
 as if for the first time, in the wondrous glory 
 of His humility, is the secret of the revival of 
 Christianity in every age. This is not innova- 
 tion ; it is renovation. 
 
 On the other hand, we have no right and we 
 ought to have no inclination to insist exclusively 
 upon any particular theory as the only possible 
 
The Human Life of God 151 
 
 explanation of the facts of the Incarnation. 
 Every earnest and thoughtful man must feel 
 that these facts are so deep and mysterious that 
 the plummet of human reason cannot sound 
 their ultimate recesses. With all our thinking 
 upon this subject, there must ever mingle a con- 
 sciousness of insufficiency and a confession of 
 ignorance. But with this confession of igno- 
 rance there must go also a clear recognition of 
 those portions of the truth which are unques- 
 tionably revealed in the New Testament. Three 
 things are there made plain to faith. 
 
 1. God is not such a being, absolute, immu- 
 table, and impassible, that the Divine Logos 
 cannot descend by a free act of self-determin- 
 ing love into the lower estate of human exist- 
 ence, and humble Himself to the conditions of 
 manhood without losing His personal iden- 
 tity.i 
 
 2. The essence of the Gospel is its declara- 
 tion of the fact that this act of condescension, 
 of self-humiliation, actually has been performed, 
 and that Jesus Christ is the eternal Son of God 
 who has taken upon Him the existence-form of 
 a servant, and lived a truly human life, and 
 been obedient even unto death, in order to re- 
 veal to the world the saving love of God. 
 
 1 See Appendix, note 37. 
 
 Three vital 
 points. 
 
152 The Human Life of God 
 
 3. The distinctive attributes of personality 
 in Christ (self-consciousness and self-deter- 
 mination) are not dual, as of two persons, 
 the one divine and the other human, co-exist- 
 ing side by side in a double life, but individual, 
 and manifested as the life of one person. That 
 per^n is the Son of God, who laid aside the 
 glory which He had with the Father, and emp- 
 tied Himself, and so became the Son of man ; 
 and on account of this humiliation God hath 
 highly exalted Him and crowned Him with 
 glory and honour as the God-man forever. 
 These points These are the points which are vital to the 
 
 YfXllSt 1)Q 
 
 defended. Ideality of the Gospel of the Incarnation. All 
 theories which make these points clear, safe- 
 guard the truth in its integrity and in its rec- 
 onciling power. The question of the method 
 of the divine humiliation and the human exal- 
 tation of Christ, lies beyond these points. It 
 is not necessary to insist upon any particular 
 form of its solution. Indeed, it may well be 
 that the profundity of the question, the inher- 
 ent mystery of the facts of life and personality 
 with which it deals, and the limitations of 
 human thought and language, preclude the 
 possibility of a complete and final answer at 
 present. It must be frankly acknowledged 
 that none of the solutions which have been pro- 
 
The Human Life of Qod 153 
 
 pounded hitherto are free from serious perplex- 
 ities. But it must be recognized with equal 
 frankness that the theories which have been 
 put forward in modern times, with new earnest- 
 ness and power, by men of unquestionable loy- 
 alty to the Christianity of the New Testament, 
 who have sought to find a clear and positive 
 meaning for the great word Keiiosis^ which 
 St. Paul uses to describe the self-emptying of 
 Christ in the Incarnation, — theories which 
 have been stigmatized as kenotic, as if the name 
 were enough to mark them as unorthodox, — 
 are so far from being heretical that they have 
 the rare merit of conserving and emphasizing a 
 truth of surpassing value, undoubtedly taught 
 in the Bible, and too much neglected, if not 
 practically denied, during many centuries of 
 theological speculation. It may be, as Julius 
 Miiller held, that the distinctive attributes of Various 
 
 . methods of 
 
 personality are, abstractly considered, identical safe-guard- 
 in God and man, so that, by the divine self- "*^ ^^^^"''^ 
 limitation in the Incarnation, they are actually 
 unified, like two circles which have a common 
 centre.^ It may be, as Dr. Fairbairn holds, 
 that the Son of God, being the eternal repre- 
 
 1 For this statement of Miiller's view, which he gave in 
 his lectures, I am indebted to Dr. George P. Fisher, who was 
 one of his hearers. 
 
154 The Human Life of Qod 
 
 sentative of the filial relationship within the 
 Godhead, the symbol of the created within the 
 uncreated, needed but to surrender the form 
 and status of the uncreated Son in order to 
 assume, by the same act, the form and status 
 which man as the created Son was intended to 
 realize. 1 It may be, as Godet holds, that the 
 Incarnation was by deprivation, and that the 
 Eternal Word renounced His divine mode of 
 being, and entered into life, without omnisci- 
 ence, omnipresence, or omnipotence, as an un- 
 conscious babe. 2 It matters little in what form 
 of words we try to express the transcendent 
 truth. But it matters much, it is supremely 
 important for the integrity of our Gospel and 
 for its influence upon the heart of this doubting 
 age, that we should hold fast to the fact that 
 the life of Jesus of Nazareth is the human life 
 of God. 
 The new The time is at hand when this simple and 
 
 Christ. profound view of Christ, which beholds in Him 
 
 the God-man in whom Deity is self-limited 
 and humbled in order that humanity may be 
 divinely exalted and perfected, must break 
 through the clouds which have obscured it, and 
 become the leading light of religion and theol- 
 
 1 The Place of Christ in Modern Theologij, p. 476. 
 
 2 Godet, Commentary on John i. 14. 
 
The Human Life of God 155 
 
 ogy. The life of Christ needs to be restudied 
 and rewritten under this luminous guidance, in 
 absolute and unhesitating loyalty to the facts 
 as they lie before our eyes in the Gospels. ^ The 
 doctrine of Christ's person needs to be recon- 
 structed and restated in this light. It must 
 include, as the creed of Chalcedon included, 
 not only the truth of a Homoousia — a sameness 
 of nature and experience — with God, which 
 the past has vindicated ; but also the equal 
 truth of a Homoousia with man, which the fut- 
 ure is to unfold as the universality of Christ's 
 manhood is exhibited through His progressive 
 triumphs among all the races of men and all 
 the modes of human life. The humanity of the 
 incarnate Christ must stand out as clear, as pos- 
 
 1 "No action of our Saviour's earthly life, from Bethleliem 
 to Calvary, exhibits divinity. He appears first as a helpless 
 babe in the manger. He is subject to His parents. As the 
 child grows, He waxes strong in spirit and increases in wis- 
 dom. Such an increase in wisdom implies increase in know- 
 ledge, and less knowledge or greater ignorance to-day than 
 to-morrow. Omniscience could not have been exercised by 
 the Jesus who was growing in wisdom. If any say here, as 
 we usually do, that the humanity grew but the divinity was 
 omniscient, let us ask if there were two persons in Jesus. 
 This Nestorianism is practically the creed of the present day 
 with the Reformed Churches. They have gone over to a 
 virtual duplication of the person of Christ." — Howard 
 Crosby, The True Humanity of Christ (New York, Ran- 
 dolph, 1880). 
 
The old 
 
 156 The Human Life of G-od 
 
 itive, as indubitable, as His Deity. Nay, more, 
 it must stand where the New Testament puts 
 it, in the foreground of faith. For it is only in 
 this humanity that we can truly find the Son of 
 God who loved us and gave Himself for us. 
 How urgent and pressing are the needs of 
 
 definitions i • - 
 
 inadequate, our own age which call US to this work! How 
 far behind us, how effete and inadequate, are 
 the terms and illustrations which were used in 
 former ages to express the results of human 
 thought in regard to the person of Christ ! 
 Recall, for instance, that fine similitude of the 
 heated sword which the Lutheran theologians 
 borrowed from the Fathers to explain the 
 union of the divine with the human in Christ! 
 To them it was satisfactory because they re- 
 garded heat as one substance and iron as 
 another substance. In their view the divine 
 nature penetrated and pervaded the human 
 nature as the caloric fluid was supposed to per- 
 meate a mass of metal. But in our world the 
 caloric fluid does not exist. Heat is not a sub- 
 stance, but a mode of motion in substances. 
 In the light of modern science the old simili- 
 tude fades into a meaningless comparison of 
 tilings which cannot be compared. 
 
 We cannot accept the scholastic terminology 
 of " natures " and '• subsistences " in the final 
 
The Human Life of Grod 157 
 
 and absolute senss in which it was once em- 
 ployed. The philosophy of realism, which 
 ascribed an objective existence to universals 
 apart from individuals, is not the philosophy of 
 to-day. Its language is not only foreign, but 
 dead. The philosophy of being and not-being 
 has opened 'to receive the philosophy of becom- 
 ing ; and, in so doing, it has been utterly trans- 
 formed. 
 
 Life is now the regnant idea ; personality its Life is the 
 utmost expression. It is in the facts of life, [^g^"^ 
 its secret potencies, its mysterious limitations 
 in germ and seed, its magnificent unfoldings in 
 the process of development that we must seek 
 our comparisons for the Incarnation. And the 
 very search will bring us face to face with the 
 conviction that life in all its manifestations 
 transcends analysis without ceasing to be the 
 object of knoAvledge. 
 
 In the living world the boundaries of imagi- ^^^ ^^^^^ 
 
 . life but can- 
 
 nation are not coterminous Avith the limits of ^o« define it. 
 apprehension. We know many facts and 
 forms of life whose modes of becoming we 
 cannot imagine. It is just as impossible for 
 us to conceive how the life of the oak, root and 
 trunk and branch and leaf, form and colour 
 and massive strength, is all folded in the tiny, 
 colourless, unshaped seed, as it is to conceive 
 
158 The Hummi Life of Grod 
 
 how tlie life of God is embodied in the man 
 Christ Jesus. But the difficulty of conceiving 
 the manner of this infolding, this embodiment, 
 does not destroy for us the reality of the life. 
 Indeed, if we could explain it entirely, if we 
 could trace it perfectly as in a diagram, if we 
 could observe it completely, as in one of those 
 beautiful models of flowers which a skilful 
 artist^ has recently made to illustrate his lect- 
 ures on botany, we should know that it was not 
 life, but only a picture of it. The picture is 
 useful, but it is not vital. The metaphor has 
 its value, but it falls far short of the truth. 
 Self-heggary and self-emptijing are but "words 
 thrown out towards " an unimaginable but not 
 unreasonable manifestation of the Divine Love 
 as life. The reality to which they point us is 
 the Son of God descending to live under all 
 the conditions and limitations of energy and 
 consciousness which are proper to the Son of 
 man : the Word made flesh and dwelling among 
 us. 
 
 IV 
 
 The import- j^ would be hard to overestimate the sisfnifi- 
 
 ance of this ... 
 
 view for the cauce of this vicw for the present age, and the 
 present age. importance of setting it forth as a living truth 
 1 William Hamilton Gibson. 
 
The Human Life of G-od 159 
 
 in the language of to-day. It is the only vieAv 
 which gives us any ground of reality for our 
 faith in the kinship of man with God. If the 
 Son of God, who is the image of the Father, by 
 laying aside the outward prerogatives of His 
 divine mode of existence, actually becomes 
 human, then, and only then, the divine image 
 in which man was created is no mere figure of 
 speech, but a substantial likeness of spiritual 
 being. 1 There is a true fellowship between 
 our souls and our Father in heaven. Virtue 
 is not a vain dream, but a definite striving 
 towards His perfection. Revelation is not a 
 deception, but a message from Him who knows 
 all to those who know only a part. Prayer is 
 not an empty form, but a real communion. 
 
 " Speak to Him, thou, for He hears, and Spirit with Spirit 
 can meet : 
 Closer is He than breathing, and nearer than hands 
 and feet." 2 
 
 This view of the spiritual relation of man to The kinship 
 God cannot possibly have any foundation in ^^^_ 
 fact, deep enough and strong enough to with- 
 stand the sweeping floods of scepticism, unless 
 it builds upon the rock of a veritable Incarna- 
 tion. The discoveries of modern science, en- 
 larging enormously our conceptions of the 
 1 See Appendix, note 38. 2 Tennyson, The Higher rantheism. 
 
160 The Human Life of Grod 
 
 physical universe, have not only put man (as 
 we said in the first lecture) in a position to 
 receive a larger and loftier vision of the glory 
 of God, but they have made such a vision in- 
 dispensable. And they have emphasized, with 
 overwhelming force, the form in which that 
 vision must come in order to meet our needs 
 and strengthen faith for its immense task. If 
 we are not to be utterly belittled and crushed 
 by the contemplation of the vast mass of matter 
 and the tremendous play of force by which we 
 are surrounded ; if we are still to hold that the 
 vital is greater than the mechanical, the moral 
 than the material, the spiritual than the j)hysi- 
 cal ; if we are to maintain the old position of 
 all noble and self -revering thought, that " man 
 is greater than the universe," — there is nothing 
 that can so profoundly confirm and establish 
 us, there is nothing that can so surely protect 
 and save us from "the distorting influences of 
 our own discoveries," as the revelation of the 
 Supreme Being in an unmistakably vital, moral, 
 spiritual, and human form. 
 The true Such a revelation at once rectifies, purifies, 
 
 view of God. 
 
 and elevates our view of God Himself. For if 
 the Son of God can surrender omnipresence, 
 omniscience, and omnipotence without destroy- 
 ing His personal identity, then the central 
 
The Human Life of Grod 161 
 
 essence of the Deity is neither infinite wisdom 
 nor infinite power, but perfect holiness and 
 perfect goodness. And so from the very 
 lowest valley of humiliation we catch clear 
 sight of the very loftiest summit of theology, 
 the serene and shining truth that God is Love. 
 
 In the light of this truth we behold also the The supreme 
 highest perfection of man and the path which i^^^^ 
 leads to it.. Love is the fulfilling of the law, 
 and the supreme pattern of love is the example 
 of Christ. And whether we look at it from 
 the divine side as the supreme self-sacrifice of 
 God, or from the human side as the complete 
 obedience of man, everything depends upon the 
 genuineness and sincerity of this example. Un- 
 less the Son of God truly became man, the In- 
 carnation cannot be, as Bishop Westcott calls 
 it, "a revelation of human duties." What 
 strength could Ave draw from His victory over 
 temptation if He was not exposed as we are 
 to the assaults of evil ? ^ What consolation 
 could we draw from His patience if He was 
 not a man of sorrows and acquainted with 
 grief ? " Jesus Christ," says one of the greatest 
 of French theologians, " is not the Son of God 
 hidden in the Son of man retaining all the 
 attributes of Divinity in a latent state. This 
 1 See Appendix, note 39. 
 
162 The Human Life of aod 
 
 would be to admit an irreducible duality which 
 would make the unity of His person vanish 
 and withdraw Him from the normal conditions 
 of human life. His obedience would become 
 illusory, and His example would be without 
 application to our race. No, when the Word 
 became flesh, He humbled Himself, He put off 
 His glory, being rich He made Himself poor, 
 and became as one of us, only without sin, that 
 He might pass through the moral conflict with 
 all the risks of freedom. "^ When we see Him 
 thus, we know what it means to follow Him 
 and to be like Him. 
 The value of Finally, the whole value of the Atonement, 
 
 the atone- .,. . ^ 
 
 tnent. 11^ its reconciling miiuence on the heart oi man, 
 
 in its exhibition of the heart of God, depends 
 upon the actuality of the Incarnation. If He 
 who died on Calvary was a mere theophany, 
 like the angel of Jehovah who appeared to 
 Abraham, then His death was merely a dra- 
 matic spectacle. The body of Jesus was broken, 
 
 God suffers but God was iiot touchcd. But if the Father 
 truly spared not His own Son, but delivered 
 Him up for us all, then the Father also suf- 
 fered by sympathy, making an invisible sacri- 
 fice, an infinite surrender of love for our sakes. 
 
 1 De Pressens6, Jesus-Christ (Paris, 1865), Book I,, chap, 
 v., p. 254. 
 
 with and for 
 us. 
 
The Human Life of God 163 
 
 Then the Son also suffered, niakhig a visible 
 sacrifice, and pouring out His soul unto death 
 to redeem us from the fear of death and the 
 power of sin. And this becomes real to our 
 faith and potent upon our souls only when we 
 see the human life of God, agonizing in the 
 garden, tortured in the judgment-hall, and ex- 
 piring upon the cross. Then we can say 
 
 " Oh Love Divine ! that stooped to share 
 Our sharpest pang, our bitterest tear." 
 
 Then we can look up to a God who is not im- 
 passible, as the speculations of men have falsely 
 represented Him, but passible, and therefore 
 full of infinite capacities of pure sorrow and 
 saving sympathy.^ Then the dumb and sullen 
 resentment which rises in noble minds at the 
 
 ,-, 1 i £ TT • • 1 • 1 j^i • Doubts cUs- 
 
 thought o± a Universe m which there is so solve in the 
 much heljDless pain and hopeless grief, created thour/ht of 
 by an immovable Being who has never felt pathy?^^^ 
 and can never feel either pain or grief, — that 
 sense of moral repulsion from the idea of an 
 unsuffering and unsympathetic Creator which 
 is, and always has been, the deepest, darkest 
 spring of doubt, fades away, and we behold a 
 God who became human in order that He 
 might bear, though innocent and undeserving, 
 all our pains and all our griefs. 
 1 See Appendix, note 40. 
 
164 The Human Life of Crod 
 
 The finding Thus we staiid before our doubting age, as 
 human David stood before the disillusioned, downcast, 
 
 ChHst. despondent Hebrew king, in Robert Browning's 
 
 splendid poem of " Saul." The word, sought in 
 vain among the glories of nature, among the 
 joys of human intercourse, the word of faith 
 and hope and love and life, comes to us, leaps 
 upon us, flashes through us. 
 
 " See the King — I would help him, but cannot, the 
 wishes fall through. 
 
 Could I wrestle to raise him from sorrow, grow poor 
 to enrich, 
 
 To fill up his life, starve my own out, I would — know- 
 ing which, 
 
 I know that my service is perfect. Oh, speak through 
 me now ! 
 
 Would I suffer for him that I love? So wouldst 
 Thou — so wilt Thou ! 
 
 So shall crown Thee the topmost, ineffablest, uttermost 
 crown — 
 
 And Thy love fill infinitude wholly, nor leave up nor 
 down 
 
 One spot for the creature to stand in ! It is by no 
 breath. 
 
 Turn of eye, wave of hand, that salvation joins issue 
 with death ! 
 
 As Thy Love is discovered almighty, almighty be 
 proved 
 
 Thy power, that exists with and for it, of being be- 
 loved ! 
 
 He who did most, shall bear most; the strongest shall 
 stand the most weak. 
 
The Human Life of G-od 165 
 
 'Tis the weakness in strength, that I cry for ! my flesh, 
 
 that I seek 
 In the Godhead! 1 seek and I find it. O Saul, it 
 
 shall be 
 A Face like my face that receives thee; a Man like 
 
 to me, 
 Thou shalt love and be loved by, forever; a Hand 
 
 like this hand 
 Shall throw open the gates of new life to thee! 
 
 See the Christ stand ! " 
 
THE SOURCE OF AUTHORITY IN 
 THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN 
 
" But Thee, but Thee, O sovereign Seer of time, 
 But Thee, O poets' Poet, Wisdom's Tongue, 
 But Thee, O man's best Man, O love's best Love, 
 O perfect life in perfect labour writ, 
 O all men's Comrade, Servant, King, or Priest, — 
 What i/or yet, what mole, what flaw, what lapse, 
 What least defect or shadow of defect, 
 What rumour, tattled by an enemy. 
 Of inference loose, what lack of grace 
 Even in torture's grasp, or sleep's, or death's, — 
 Oh, what amiss may I forgive in Thee, 
 Jesus, good Paragon, thou Crystal Christ ? " 
 
 — Sidney Lanier, The CrystaL 
 
THE SOURCE OF AUTHORITY IN 
 THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN 
 
 Preach Christ, is the apostolic watchword The new 
 that rings to-day, with all the force and charm ^^^^^ 
 of a new commandment, through the heart of 
 a Church, which has felt, more deeply than it 
 has yet confessed, the age-pervading chill of 
 a winter of doubt and discontent. The very 
 entrance of that mystic and reviving word has 
 already brought a glow of enthusiasm into the 
 Christian life, and caused new blossoms of hope 
 and love, manifold and beautiful activities of 
 help and healing, to appear in the earth. It 
 seems as if some fresh and secret tide of vital- 
 ity were flowing through the veins of Christen- 
 dom, and breaking everywhere towards the 
 light in deeds of charity and enterprises of 
 mercy. Hospitals, asylums, red cross societies, 
 rescue missions, salvation armies, spring into 
 existence as if by magic. Never has there 
 been a time when Christian men have tried to 
 169 
 
170 The Source of Autliority 
 
 The neio ([q go mucli for their fellow-men in the name 
 and for the sake of Christ. Never has there 
 been a time when they have recognized so 
 clearly and fully that there was so much yet 
 to be done. It is an age of secular doubt, as 
 many other ages have been. But it is also an 
 age of Christian beneficence, as hardly any 
 other age has been. And this beneficence is 
 not self-satisfied and complacent. It is self- 
 reproachful, and, in its best expressions, nobly 
 discontented with all that has been accom- 
 plished hitherto. It seeks, not always wisely, 
 but with splendid eagerness, for plans which 
 shall lead beyond the relief, to the prevention 
 of human suffering. It aims to bring about 
 not only the immediate mitigation, but also the 
 ultimate abolition, of war. It demands that 
 charity shall be translated into the terms of 
 national, as well as of individual life. It will 
 not be satisfied until in some real and palpable 
 sense the kingdom of this world is become the 
 kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ.^ 
 
 Christ is the Now this renewal, this splendid expansion of 
 Christian activities, evident by many signs to 
 all thoughtful observers, depends for its power 
 and permanence upon the setting forth of 
 Christ, vividly, personally, practically, as the 
 1 Rev. xi. 15. 
 
 fountain. 
 
The Source of Authority 171 
 
 pattern of all virtue and the Prince of Peace 
 among men. The sense of absolute confidence 
 in Him as the perfect example of goodness, and 
 of thorough loyalty to Him as the Master of 
 noble life, is the hidden reservoir of moral 
 force. The organized charities of Christendom 
 are the distributing system. Not more instant 
 and more complete would be the water-famine 
 on Manhattan Island if the great dam among 
 the Croton hills were broken and all the lakes 
 and streams dried up, than the drought that 
 would fall upon the beneficence of the world if 
 there were a sudden break in the reservoir of 
 love and loyalty in Christian hearts to their 
 moral Master, or a stoppage of the myriad and 
 multiform feeders which keep it full by preach- 
 ing Christ. 
 
 But in all this renewal and expansion of what The peril of 
 is well and proudly called practical Christianity, Christianity. 
 tliere is, if I mistake not, a danger, or at lea^t 
 a serious possibility, of loss. The life of man 
 is not only practical, it is also intellectual. His 
 relations to his fellow-men are important, but 
 his relation to truth is no less important. He 
 cannot help acting ; neither can he help think- * 
 ing. When his thinking is divorced from his 
 acting, when he has one standard for truth and 
 a different standard for conduct, he is like a 
 
172 The Source of Authority 
 
 house divided against itself. If the Christian- 
 ity of to-day, by dwelling exclusively or too 
 much on the ethical side of the Gospel as a 
 beautiful and beneficent rule of conduct illus- 
 trated by a perfect Example, tends to ignore the 
 intellectual necessities of man and fails to real- 
 ize that it has a message to deliver in the realm 
 of truth as well as in the realm of righteous- 
 ness, it will not and it cannot meet the deepest 
 wants of the present age. Indeed, it may even 
 aggravate those Avants and make them more 
 painful. It may seem to give assent, by 
 silence, to the desperate assumption of scepti- 
 cism that the unseen world is unknown and 
 unknowable, even to the most perfect of men. 
 It may foster the sad feeling that the reality of 
 religion is beyond our reach and that we must 
 content ourselves with the convenient dreams 
 of virtue. It may preach, in effect, a Christ 
 whose character and conduct are to be accepted 
 as infallible, but whose thoughts and convic- 
 tions in regard to God and the soul and the 
 future life are mere fallacies and illusions. 
 What does Preach Christy if it is to be a true watchword 
 
 to preach ' ^^^ ^ur ministry to the present age, must be 
 Christ? cleared and vivified and expanded in our con- 
 sciousness. We must know what we mean by 
 it, and we must try to know what we ought to 
 
The Source of Autliority 173 
 
 mean. We must ask ourselves again and again 
 whether the thing that we do mean is always 
 quite, or even approximately, the thing that we 
 ought to mean when we use this precious and 
 powerful phrase. It was commonly employed, 
 say fifty years ago, to describe by way of dis- 
 tinction a presentation of Jesus which dwelt 
 chiefly or entirely upon His death as the vicari- 
 ous sacrifice for sin. It is frequently employed 
 now as if it meant little or nothing more than 
 the graphic description of Christ's life and 
 actions as the supreme type of virtue and love. 
 But surely to preach Christ exclusively in either 
 of these ways is to divide Him. It is not enough 
 to have a Christocentric theology. It is not 
 enough to have a Christocentric morality. We 
 must not only put Him at the centre; but we 
 must also draw the circumference so that it 
 shall embrace the whole of human life. 
 
 If Christ is the Lamb of God that taketh A gospel for 
 away the sin of the world,^ He is also the true ^i^^^i^ ^j- 
 Light which lighteth every man that cometh human life. 
 into the world. ^ If He is the fulfilment of all 
 dim prophecies of good, He is also the head and 
 source of a new unfolding of spiritual vision. 
 If He is the way and the life. He is also the 
 truth. 3 If He is immortal love, regenerating 
 
 1 St. John i. 29. 2 gt, John i. 9. 3 st. John xiv. 6. 
 
174 
 
 The Source of Autliority 
 
 the affections, He is also immortal wisdom re- 
 organizing the tliouglits, and immortal power 
 strengthening the wills, of men. If His heart 
 is to be the norm of our feeling, His mind is 
 to be the norm of our thinking. If He is the 
 herald and founder of a new and celestial 
 dominion upon earth, He is also the source of 
 authority in the kingdom of heaven. 
 
 The king- 
 dom of 
 heaveyi the 
 keynote of 
 ChrisVs 
 teaching. 
 
 The idea of the kingdom of heaven, as an act- 
 ual reign of God over living men, in which all 
 ancient anticipations of good are accomplished 
 and a new state of virtue and blessedness is es- 
 tablished on earth, was foremost and dominant 
 in the teaching of Jesus. ^ It Avas the keynote 
 of His ministry. Everything that He said, 
 everything that He did, was in harmony with 
 this master thought. 
 
 It is passing strange to see how often and 
 hoAv utterly this keynote has been changed in 
 the variations which men have woven about the 
 
 1 The word "kingdom " is used in tlie Gospels more than 
 a hundred times to express the new condition of human life 
 which Christ came to announce and establish. In St. 
 Matthew's Gospel the favourite phrase is "the kingdom of 
 heaven." St. Mark and St. Luke use "the kingdom of 
 God." 
 
The Source of Authority 175 
 
 original theme of Christianity ; and how far ^alse inter- 
 
 ^ „ , . -,11 1 pretations. 
 
 we are, even yet, irom hearing it clearly, ana 
 sounding it with dominant fulness, in the 
 music of religion. At times the kingdom of 
 heaven has been identified with the visible 
 church as an outward embodiment of power in 
 the world. And surely this interpretation is 
 far enough away from the thought of Christ, 
 who taught expressly that the kingdom was 
 invisible and inward. At other times men have 
 removed their conception from the present to 
 the future, and looked for its realization in the 
 life of the redeemed after death, or in the second 
 coming of Christ to reign in millennial glory. 
 And surely this interpretation is equally remote 
 from Christ's teaching, at the very outset of His 
 ministry and all through its course, that the 
 kingdom of heaven was at hand, that it had 
 already come near to man, and was lying all 
 around them, close to them, pressing upon them 
 from every side so that many were already en- 
 tering into it and dAvelling within it.^ 
 
 The unreality and incompleteness of these The idea 
 
 . , , , . c , 1 1 • 1 almost lost. 
 
 two opposite interpretations oi the kingdom 
 
 produced their natural results. The idea fell 
 
 out of its true place in Christian thought. It 
 
 became obscure, subordinate, and was finally 
 
 1 See Appendix, note 41. 
 
176 The Source of Autliority 
 
 almost obliterated. No further illustration of 
 this statement is necessary than that which 
 may be obtained by consulting one of the most 
 popular aids to the study of the Bible : Talbot's 
 Analysis^ revised by the Rev. Nathaniel West, 
 and again revised by the Rev. Dr. Roswell D. 
 Hitchcock, and set forth under the title of A 
 Co7nplete Analysis of the Holy Bible; or^ the 
 Whole Bible arranged in Subjects.^ In the in- 
 dex to this work there is but one solitary 
 reference to the kingdom of God. When we 
 turn to look at it, we find eleven verses, under 
 the heading of " Tlie Millennium ; the Growth of 
 the Kingdom of God." The kingdom of heaven 
 is dismissed with a general reference to the 
 Parables. To any one who is really familiar 
 with his New Testament, the insufficiency of 
 such a treatment of one of its controlling ideas 
 must appear evident and surprising. 
 The idea But it may be said that in very recent times 
 
 there has been an intense revival of interest in 
 this idea and an immense amount of good work 
 done in the study and explication of it. This 
 is true and it should be gratefully recognized. 
 Such books as those which Dr. James S. Cand- 
 lish and Professor A. B. Bruce have written 
 
 1 Wilmore's New xinalytical Eeference Bible (New York, 
 1891). 
 
 begins to he 
 restored. 
 
The Source of Authority 177 
 
 upon " The Kingdom of God," are most valua- 
 ble gifts to Christian literature.^ And yet I 
 will frankly confess that these books, and others 
 like them, seem to me rather to point the way 
 than to reach the goal. The fulness of the 
 conception of the kingdom of heaven is not 
 yet restored in current theology. Its regnancy 
 in all spheres of human life is not yet com- 
 pletely rounded. There is still a great deal 
 of work to be done in this direction by the 
 Christian thinker and the Christian preacher. 
 The vision of the kingdom is obscured, the 
 proclamation of the kingdom is weakened, be- 
 cause it is still presented too exclusively as 
 a kingdom of grace, and not with equal em- 
 phasis as a kingdom of truth : it is set up too 
 partially as a standard for the character and 
 conduct of men, and not with equal clearness 
 as a standard for their thoughts and convic- 
 tions. 
 
 One reason of thisone-sidedness, it seems to it must he 
 
 T • 1 p 1 1 1 • 1 i T studied in 
 
 me, lies m the fact that we have hitherto been 
 
 all four 
 
 looking almost entirely to the first three Gos- 
 pels as the source of our knowledge of the true 
 
 1 The Kingdom of God, Biblically and Historically Con- 
 sidered, James 8. Candlish (Edinburgh, Clarks, 1884). The 
 Kingdom of God, or Christ's Teaching according to the 
 Synoptical Gospels, Alexander Balmain Bruce (New York, 
 Scribners, 1889). 
 
178 The Source of Authority 
 
 meaning of the kingdom of heaven. But the 
 Fourth Gospel, if indeed it be, as the best 
 modern scholars say it is, "the most faithful 
 image and memorial of Jesus that any man 
 could produce," must be no less important, no 
 less significant in the light which it throws 
 upon this controlling idea of His mind. And 
 when we turn to study it with this aim in view, 
 we find at once that it gives us what we need. 
 It completes and rounds out the record of the 
 three other Gospels. It answers the ques- 
 tions which they suggest. It keeps the prom- 
 ises which they seem to make to our faith. 
 And it is only when we take the fourfold 
 narrative in its entirety that we begin to catch 
 sight of the satisfying and convincing fulness 
 of the idea of the kingdom of heaven. 
 The king- This idea underlies the whole Gospel accord- 
 
 dom in , c^ -r t t • t c i 
 
 St. John. ii^g" to bt. John. It IS no less fundamental, no 
 less necessary here than it is in the Synoptic 
 Gospels. It is presented in different forms, 
 because the type of the writer's mind and the 
 purpose of his book are different. But it is 
 the same idea. And this presentation of it is 
 essential to its completeness. 
 
 In the Synoptics we have the conditions of 
 entrance into the kingdom, a child-like spirit,^ 
 1 St. Matt, xviii. 3. 
 
The Source of Authority 179 
 
 faith,! repentance,^ and obedience. ^ In St. John Compared 
 we have the spiritual birth by which alone synoptics. 
 those conditions are made possible.* In the 
 Synoptics we have the laws of the kingdom.^ 
 In St. John we have the new life in which 
 alone those laws can be fulfilled.^ In the 
 Synoptics we have the parables and pictures 
 of the kingdom.'^ In St. John we have the 
 inmost sense of those parables, spoken directly 
 to the soul, in words of which Christ Himself 
 says "they are spirit, and they are life." ^ In 
 the Synoptics we have the new order of human 
 society in the imitation by the disciples of 
 Christ's obedience to the will of God.^ In St. 
 John we have the organizing principle of that 
 new order in Christ's revelation of Himself to 
 the disciples as the way, the truth, and the 
 life.!^ In the Synoptics we have the supremacy 
 of Christ's example over men's hearts. In St. 
 John we have the supremacy of Christ's teach- 
 ings over men's minds. 
 
 Of course, I do not mean to say that either 
 
 1 St. Matt. ix. 22 ; St. Mark ^ St. Matt, xiii., xxi., xxv. ; 
 
 X, 52. St. Luke xiii., xvii., xix., 
 
 2 St. Luke xiii. 3. etc. 
 
 3 St. Matt. V. 20. 8 St. John vi. 63; viii. 12-5L 
 
 4 St. John iii. 5. ^ St. Matt. xii. 50. 
 
 5 The Sermon on the Mount. ^'^ St. John xiv. 6. 
 
 6 St. John vi. 22-65. 
 
180 The Source of Authority 
 
 Both vieivs of these aspects of the kingdom is confined ex- 
 clusively to the source in which it is most fully 
 and clearly exliibited.^ But this is what I 
 mean. The Synoptics give us the first and 
 simplest description of the nature of the king- 
 dom. St. John gives us the fullest and clear- 
 est revelation of the mind of the King. We 
 cannot understand the former without the lat- 
 ter. We cannot enter into the full meaning 
 of the initial proclamation of Jesus, when He 
 walked beside the Sea of Galilee crying " The 
 kingdom of heaven has come near," ^ unless we 
 go on with Him to the judgment-liall, and hear 
 Him give His final answer to Pilate : " Thou 
 sayest that I am a King ; to this end have I 
 been born, and to this end am I come into the 
 world, that I should bear witness unto the 
 truth ; every one that is of the truth heareth 
 my voice. "^ 
 
 When we stand at this point, when we ac- 
 cept this declaration as the key to unlock and 
 open the inmost meaning of the manifestation 
 of the Father in the human life of the Son, we 
 
 ^ See Bruce, The Kingdom of God, p. 185, on the personal 
 claim of Christ in the Synoptics. See R. F. Horton, The 
 Teaching of Jesus (New York, 1896) , pp. 219-233, on relation 
 between Synoptic doctrine of the kingdom and Johannine 
 doctrine of eternal life. 
 
 2 St. Matt. iv. 17. 3 St. John xviii. 37. 
 
The Source of Authority 181 
 
 begin to apprehend the inexhaustible scope and ^^^^ kUig- 
 significance of our call to preach Christ to an \isZ7nliTos 
 age of doubt. It is a gospel not only for the .9''«ce. 
 affections, but also for the intellect. It takes 
 up His words as well as His works and makes 
 them vital in the lives of men. It conceives 
 and j)roclaims the kingdom of heaven as some- 
 thing more than " the reign of divine love ex- 
 ercised by God in His grace over human hearts 
 believing in His love and constrained thereby 
 to yield Him grateful affection and devoted 
 service." 1 It is also the reign of divine truth 
 exercised through a faithful witness over the 
 minds of men who submit to His guidance and 
 are led by Him into inward peace and unity of 
 thought. 2 And the source of authority in this 
 kingdom of heaven, which is equally a realm of 
 truth and a realm of grace, is Jesus the Christ, 
 whose doctrine, as well as His example, is ulti- 
 mate and supreme. 
 
 II 
 
 Let us observe in passing that we have pre- The King as 
 
 . 1 .1 T ' J '^ • 1 a teacher. 
 
 cisely the same basis to rest upon m our preach- 
 ing of the doctrine of Jesus as in our preaching 
 of His character and life. If historical criticism 
 
 1 Bruce, The Kingdom of God, p. 40. 
 
 2 See Appendix, note 12. 
 
182 Tlie Source of Authority 
 
 gives us good reason to believe, as all candid 
 inquirers now admit, that the four Gospels con- 
 tain a veritable picture of an actual personage 
 who once lived on earth, there is equally good 
 reason to believe that they have preserved for 
 us a trustworthy account of His teaching in its 
 substance and spirit. If we can justly claim 
 Thedoctnne that His character is so perfect and transcen- 
 dent that no man of that age, however gifted or 
 learned, and least of all such men as the writers 
 of the New Testament, could possibly have in- 
 vented it ; we can make the same claim, Avith 
 equal justice, for the body of doctrine which 
 is attributed to Christ. In its coherence, its 
 clarity, its sublimity, and its universality it 
 altogether surpasses the mental abilities and 
 the religious insight of the writers of the four 
 Gospels. Indeed, it is frankly confessed that 
 the disciples of Jesus were so far from being 
 able to invent His doctrine, that they actually 
 misunderstood and misinterpreted many of its 
 truths when they first heard them. It was 
 contrary to their prejudices and expectations. 
 They did not put it into His mouth. He re- 
 vealed it to their minds. Their faitli in it 
 rested upon His personal authority. And it 
 was only as they kept company with Him 
 and followed Him, receiving His word into 
 
The Soui'ce of Authority 183 
 
 their souls and translating it into their lives, 
 that it became to them luminous and satisfy- 
 ing and convincing. 
 
 We are entitled, or rather we are compelled, ^'^ objective 
 
 . reality. 
 
 to regard the teaching or Jesus as an objective 
 fact just as much as His life and character. ^ 
 The record of it bears on its face the over- 
 whelming evidence of verity. All the results 
 of literary criticism are squarely against the 
 supposition that such a doctrine as that which 
 is presented to us under His name in the four 
 Gospels, could ever have been pieced together 
 out of the thoughts and imaginations of widely 
 separated and divergent minds, and attributed 
 to an unknown and perhaps mythical Master. 
 It is not a mosaic ; it is a living unity. It is 
 not a creation of faith ; it is the creator of faith. 
 The hypothesis that four men agreed, or hap- 
 pened, to gather together out of the Hebrew 
 prophets, and the heathen philosophers, and the 
 mysterious and inexplicable inner conscious- 
 ness of the new-born Christian churches, cer- 
 tain beautiful ideas in regard to God and the 
 soul and the future life, and ascribe them to 
 Jesus, utterly breaks down at the touch of real- 
 ity. The central, unifying, formative quality 
 of the teaching of Christ is the one thing that 
 1 See Appendix, note 43. 
 
184 TJie Source of Authority 
 
 is most evident in the record. It is empha- 
 sized by all the phenomena of growth, of vital 
 development, of deepening power, which may 
 be traced from the sermon in the synagogue 
 at Nazareth to the discourse in the upper room 
 at Jerusalem. It sliines out unmistakably 
 through all the living variety of impressions 
 which it made upon various minds, and 
 through all the consequent many-sidedness of 
 the report which is given of it. Not more 
 certainly did the character of Christ inspire 
 and unite the lives of His followers than 
 His doctrine illuminated and controlled their 
 beliefs. The only view which meets the facts 
 is that Jesus really lived, and really taught, 
 thus and so, as He is presented to us in the 
 Gospels. 
 The form of This brings us at once to the most important 
 feature in the record of His teaching". It is not 
 given to us in the form of an abstract system, 
 a treatise on theology, or a summary of doc- 
 trine, written down l)y the hand of Jesus. He 
 Himself made no record of His words. Only 
 once do we see Him writing, — in the beautiful 
 episode which a later tradition has added to the 
 eighth chapter of St. John's Gospel. Histori- 
 cal or not, the incident is profoundly sugges- 
 tive. For Jesus Avrote not with a pen upon 
 
The Source of AutJiority 185 
 
 enduring parchment, nor with a stylus upon 
 
 imperishable brass : 
 
 " He stooped 
 And wrote upon the unrec .rding ground."'^ 
 
 He would not leave even a single line of manu- 
 script where His followers could preserve it 
 with literal reverence and worship it as a 
 sacred relic. He chose to inscribe His teach- 
 ing upon no other leaves than those which are 
 folded within the human soul. He chose to 
 trust His words to the faithful keeping of 
 memory and love ; and He said of them, with 
 sublime confidence, that they should never pass 
 away. 2 He chose that the truth which He 
 declared and the life which He lived should 
 never be divided, but that they should go down 
 together through the ages.^ 
 
 And this is precisely what has come to pass, inseparahh 
 The Churcli in past ao^es has often been inclined -^7"' ^^^^ 
 
 ^ '^ character. 
 
 to abstract the doctrines of Christianity concern- 
 ing the person and work of Christ from their 
 union with His human life, and to condense 
 them into a purely formal system of dogma for 
 the intellect. The Church in the present age 
 shows at least a tendency to separate the image 
 
 1 Katrina Trask, "A Night and Morning in Jerusalem" 
 {Harper's Magazine, April, 1890). 
 
 2 St. Mark xiii. 31. 2 gee Appendix, note 44. 
 
186 The So2i7'ce of Authority 
 
 of Jesus from the truths which He taught, and 
 hold Him up to men merely as an ideal of holi- 
 ness and goodness. But the one barrier that 
 stands firm against both these false tendencies 
 is the marvellous narrative of the Gospels, in 
 which the life and the doctrine of Christ are 
 woven together, one and inseparable, now and 
 forever. 
 Words and How cau we understand His grace, unless we 
 
 life interpret j tt- j .i o tt • tt- 
 
 each other, accept His truth ( How can we appreciate His 
 truth, unless we receive His grace ? At every 
 step, His action is interpreted and explained by 
 His words. ^ He trusts in Providence, and He 
 commands His disciples to trust, not merely be- 
 cause submissive confidence is a beautiful and 
 happy thing, but because He knows and declares 
 that God is really a Father, worthy to be trusted. ^ 
 He prays, secretly and openly ; secretly because 
 He is sure that God hears Him always, and 
 openly because He would fain give this as- 
 surance to others.^ He seeks the sinful and 
 the lost, not merely becauise such a ministry is 
 lovely and gracious, but because He knows and 
 declares that it is the will of God, and that 
 there is more joy in heaven over one sinner 
 that repenteth than over ninety-and-nine just 
 
 1 See Appendix, note 45. 
 
 2 St. Matt. vi. 25-30. 3 St. John xi. 41, 42. 
 
The Source of Autliority 187 
 
 men that need no repentance.^ He cares for 
 the bodies of men and He relieves their wants, 
 but He cares infinitely more for their souls and 
 He teaches them to care more, because He 
 knows and declares that the soul is immortal 
 and more precious than all that this world can 
 give. 2 He moves willingly and obediently to 
 the cross, not because it is inevitable, not be- 
 cause resignation is the crown of virtue, but 
 because He knows and declares that this is the 
 sacrifice appointed for Him as the Christ, the 
 laying down of His life as a ransom for many, 
 the lifting up by which He is to draw all men 
 unto Himself.^ He goes down into death with 
 unshaken courage, not because it is a fine thing 
 to be brave, but because He knoAVS and declares 
 that He is returning to the Father and that He 
 will bring those who love Him to be with Him 
 where He is forever.* 
 
 Now these are declarations of great truths. The doctrine 
 If we deny them, if we make them uncertain, iasiso/His 
 the life which was built upon them has no conduct. 
 meaning, no substance, no power in it. It be- 
 comes a splendid illusion, a heroic mistake. 
 
 1 St. Luke XV. 7. 
 
 2 St. John vi. 27; St. Mark viii. 3(5, 37. 
 
 3 St. Mark ix 12 ; St. Matt. xx. 28 ; St. John xii. 32. 
 
 4 St. John xiv. 1-3. 
 
188 The Source of Aidho7'ity 
 
 But if we acce^^t them, then, and only then, 
 that life becomes the rock of our . confidence, 
 the substance of things hojDcd for and the evi- 
 dence of things not seen.^ For it was on the 
 knowledge of these things that Jesus actually 
 founded His own character and His conduct. 
 It was by believing thus and so, and by living 
 up to His belief, that He was made perfect. 
 And it was by teaching His disciples to believe 
 thus and so that He would bind them to follow 
 His example and inspire them to share His life. 
 " Whosoever heareth these sayings of mine and 
 doeth them, I will liken liim unto a wise man 
 which built his house upon a rock."^ "Now 
 ye are clean through the word which I have 
 spoken unto you." "If ye abide in me, and 
 my words abide in 3^ou, ye shall ask what ye 
 will and it shall be done unto you."^ 
 
 1 " Niclit das Leben Jesu an sich in seinem geschiclitlichen 
 Verlaufe, sondern die Aiiffassung der religiosen Bedeutung 
 desselben, auf welche die alteste N. T. liclie Verkundigung 
 ruht, bildet den Ausgangspunkt fur die biblische Theologie, 
 Diese Auffassung war aber zunachst bedingt durcli die Lehre 
 Jesu, sofern dieselbe die autlientisclie Erlauterung liber die 
 Bedeutung seiner Person und seiner Ersclieinung gab, und 
 dalier muss eine Uarstellung dieser Lelire den grundlegenden 
 Abschnitt der biblischen Theologie bilden." — Bernhard 
 Weiss, Lehrhuch der Biblischen Theologie des Neuen Testa- 
 ments (2te Auflage, Berlin, 1873), p. 31. 
 
 2 St. Matt. vii. 24. 3 gt. John xv. 3, 7. 
 
The Source of Autliority 189 
 
 in 
 
 The importance which Christ ascribed to The 
 His words as the authoritative revelation of "^^/jf''^'^/ 
 
 of Christ i 
 
 unseen verities to the confused and darkened teaching. 
 minds of men, cannot be denied or overlooked 
 by any one who reads the Gospels candidly and 
 intelligently. It is true, indeed, that He ex- 
 pressly disclaimed the idea that His doctrine 
 was created, or invented, or even discovered by 
 Himself. He said, "My doctrine is not mine 
 but His that sent me," ^ "All things that I 
 have heard of my Father I have made known 
 unto you. "2 But it is equally true that He 
 claimed an absolute infallibility for the mes- 
 sage which was revealed in Him, committed 
 unto Him, and delivered by Him. This claim 
 is made Avith equal force in the Synoptics and 
 in St. John. "No one knoweth who the Son 
 is, save the Father ; and who the Father is, 
 save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son 
 willeth to reveal Him."^ " We speak that we 
 do know, and bear witness of that we have 
 seen."* This is not the language that an 
 honest and conscientious teacher would use to 
 describe his religious opinions or his spiritual 
 
 1 St. John vii. 16. 3 St. Luke x. 22. 
 
 2 St. John XV. 15. 4 St. John iii. 11. 
 
h is 
 original. 
 
 190 The Source of Authority 
 
 hopes. The wisest and the best of men have 
 always hesitated to assume this tone of cer- 
 tainty in regard to their deepest reflections 
 upon the mysteries of being. But from first 
 to last this tone marks the teaching of Jesus. 
 '^ They were astonished at His teaching ; for 
 He taught them as having authority, and not 
 as the scribes." 1 
 
 It is evident that He intended to speak thus. 
 For notliing is more striking in tlie manner of 
 His teaching than the absence of all reliance 
 upon corroborative testimony or traditional 
 support. 2 He did not seek to defend His posi- 
 tions with a formidable array of great names. 
 He did not make a long catena of quotations 
 from learned sources. He gave out His doc- 
 trine from the depth of His own consciousness 
 as a flower breathes perfume, fresh, pure, origi- 
 nal, and convincing. He certainly felt a Divine 
 inspiration in the ancient Hebrew Scriptures. 
 The law and the prophets conveyed to Him the 
 
 1 St. Mark i. 22. 
 
 2 " Avec une certitude sereine, qui iie semble pas terrestre, 
 11 disait ces choses. II cliantait, comme aucun proph^te 
 n'avait su le faire, le chant des revoirs ^ternels qui a berc6 
 pendant des si^cles les souffrances et les agonies. Et ce 
 chant-1^, voici que de nos jours, au triste d^clin des temps, 
 les hommes se meurent de ne plus I'entendre." — Pierre 
 LoTi, La Galilee (Paris, 1896), p. 94. 
 
The Source of Autliority 191 
 
 word of God. He used them on certain occa- 
 sions to repel the assaults of evil, as in the temp- 
 tation in the wilderness. He used them on other 
 occasions to convince and convict the Scribes 
 and Pharisees out of their own Scriptures. 
 But He never rested upon them as the sole and 
 sufficient basis of His doctrine. He was not a 
 commentator on truths already revealed. He ^new 
 
 revelation 
 
 was a revealer of new truth. His teaching was 
 not the exposition ; it was the text. And this 
 higher revelation not only fulfilled, but also 
 surpassed, the old ; replacing the temporal by 
 the eternal, the figurative by the factual, the 
 literal by the spiritual, the imperfect by the 
 perfect. How often Jesus quoted from the Old 
 Testament in order to show that it w^as al- 
 ready old and insufficient; that its forms of 
 speech and rules of conduct w^ere like tlie husk 
 of the seed which must be shattered by the 
 emergence of the living germ. His doctrine 
 was in fact a moral and intellectual day- 
 break for the world. He did far more than 
 supply a novel system of conduction for an 
 ancient light. He sent forth from Himself a 
 new illumination, transcending all that had 
 gone before, as the sunrise overfloods the pale 
 glimmering of the morning star set like a 
 beacon of promise upon the coast of dawn. 
 
192 The Source of Authority 
 
 It is self- He did not rely upon reasoning for the proof 
 
 of His doctrine. He put no trust in the com- 
 pulsion of logic, in the keenness of dialectics. 
 We look in vain among His words for an 
 exhibition of the "evidences of Christianity." 
 He did not endeavour to demonstrate the ex- 
 istence of God or the immortality of the soul. 
 What He said was meant to be its own evi- 
 dence. His method was not apologetic ; it 
 was declaratory. 
 
 " He argued not, but preached, and conscience did the rest." 
 
 The result of this is marvellous and magnifi- 
 cent. His teaching is cleared and disentangled 
 from all that is temporary and transient in 
 human thought. If He had reasoned with 
 men, it must have been done upon the prem- 
 isses and in the forms of philosophy current 
 in that age. Otherwise He could not have 
 reached their intelligence, His reasoning would 
 have been of none effect. But because He 
 passed by all these processes and left them on 
 one side while His doctrine moved simply, di- 
 rectly, and majestically to the heart of the truth, 
 it comes to us to-day free and unencumbered 
 by any of those theories of physical science, of 
 psychology, of political economy, which the 
 growth of knowledge has changed, discredited. 
 
The Source of Authority 193 
 
 or discarded. His teaching is neither ancient ^^ ^'« ^^^- 
 nor modern, neither deductive nor inductive, 
 neither Jewish nor Greek. It is universal, 
 enduring, valid for all minds and for all times. 
 There are no more difficulties in the way of 
 accepting it now than there were when it was 
 first delivered. It fits the spiritual needs of 
 the nineteenth, as closely as it fitted the 
 spiritual needs of the first, century. It car- 
 ries the same attractions, the same credentials 
 in the Western Hemisphere as it carried in 
 the Eastern. It stands out as clearly from all 
 the later, as it did from all the earlier, philoso- 
 phies. It finds the soul as inevitably to-day 
 as it did at first. And the men of this age 
 who hear Christ can only say, as His disciples 
 said long ago, '' Lord, to whom shall we go ? 
 Thou hast the words of eternal life.''^ 
 
 And yet how few are those words, compared -^^ ^'« «^"«^^ 
 
 in compass. 
 
 With the utterances oi other teachers. How 
 small in compass is the doctrine of Jesus as it 
 has come down to us. Eighty pages of a duo- 
 decimo book will hold all of His recorded dis- 
 courses and the story of His life. Other words 
 He must have spoken while He was on earth, 
 but I doubt not that they moved within the 
 same circle. For even in the present record 
 1 St. John vi. 68. 
 
194 
 
 The Source of Autliority 
 
 Itsfontal 
 quality. 
 
 An unfail- 
 ing source. 
 
 we find the same truths recurring again and 
 again, expressed in different Language, arranged 
 in different sequence, as the evangelists re- 
 trace, each from his own point of view, the 
 memory of the things which Jesus taught to 
 the multitudes and to His disciples. The lit- 
 erature of the Avorld holds no other doctrine 
 so limited in bulk, so limitless in meaning. 
 
 The teaching of Christ differs from that of 
 all other masters in its fontal quality. It is 
 comprised in a little space, but it has an infi- 
 nite fulness. Its utterance is closely bounded, 
 but its significance is inexhaustible. The 
 sacred books of other religions, the commen- 
 taries and expositions on the Christian religion, 
 spread before us a vast and intricate expanse, 
 like lakes of truth mixed with error, stretch- 
 ing away into the distance, arm after arm, 
 bay after bay, until we despair of being able 
 even to explore their coasts and trace their 
 windings. When we come back to Christ, Ave 
 find, not an inland sea of doctrine, but a clear 
 fountain of living water, springing up into 
 everlasting life. 
 
 Calm, pure, unfathomable, it is never clouded 
 and it never fails. The inspiration of other 
 teachers rises and falls like an intermittent 
 spring. To-day it is brimming full; to-mor- 
 
The Source of Authority 195 
 
 row it is empty and dry. But the truth that 
 flows from Jesus is constant and unvarying. 
 The Spirit always rests upon Him. The 
 Father is always with Him. Out of the deep 
 serenity of His soul, as from some secret vale 
 of peace high among the eternal hills, the vital 
 spring of truth w^ells up forever, and forever 
 the crystal stream runs down to refresh and 
 revive the souls of men. 
 
 New meanings come out of the teaching of -Ahoays 
 Jesus in every land and in every age. New 
 stars are mirrored in its de^^ths. New flowers 
 blossom on its banks. New fields of love are 
 fertilized by its waters. It is not that each 
 succeeding century and race adds something of 
 its own to the doctrine of Christ. It is that 
 each finds in that source something which was 
 meant to become its own, and so to satisfy its 
 deepest needs. The old questions are repeated 
 in new words, and the new answer comes in the 
 old words. 1 The truth as it is in Jesus does 
 not have to be changed and adapted to fit it for 
 a world-wide missionary enterprise. It needs 
 only to be purified from the things that men 
 
 1 " Socrates asked questions which his disciples tried to 
 answer ; Jesus provoked His disciples to ask questions which 
 He answered." — James Stalker, Imago Christi (New York, 
 Armstrongs, 1889), p. 270. 
 
plicity that 
 is in Christ 
 
 196 The Source of Authority 
 
 have mingled with it, restored to the simplicity 
 that is in Christ, and it proves itself as fresh, as 
 satisfying, as life-bestowing to the thirsty soul 
 in America or in the islands of the sea, as it did 
 in Galilee or on the hillsides of Judea. 
 The Sim- When we ask ourselves why it is that the 
 
 doctrine of the Master has this enduring, self- 
 renewing, fontal character, I think we must 
 find the answer in the fact that it simply bears 
 witness, with a directness and inevitableness 
 altogether unparalleled, to the actual existence 
 of a spiritual world corresponding to the spirit- 
 ual faculties and aspirations of men. It does 
 not turn aside to discuss metaphysical problems 
 or theological subtleties. The distinction be- 
 tween the natural and the supernatural does not 
 even appear in the teaching of Jesus. There 
 may, or there may not, be such a distinction. 
 If there is. He at least does not think it impor- 
 tant enough to speak of it. The one thing of 
 which He wishes to make men sure is that the 
 same God who sends His sunshine and His rain 
 upon the evil and upon the good, the same God 
 whose bounty feeds the birds of the air and 
 clothes the lilies of the field with beauty, hears 
 in secret the prayers of the penitent and believ- 
 ing and rewards them openly. The question 
 of the how and the where of the life after death 
 
The Source of Authority 197 
 
 is not even touched in the teaching of Jesus. 
 It matters little. The one thing that He de- 
 clares with unfaltering certainty is the reality 
 of that life. The one thing that He presses 
 home upon the minds of men with calm inten- 
 sity is the danger of losing it through sin and 
 unbelief. The one thing that He tenderly and 
 urgently pleads with them to do, is to make 
 sure of its immortal blessedness through faith 
 and love and obedience to Him. And so, at 
 every point. He passes by the non-essential to 
 touch the essential, He disregards the passing 
 curiosity to satisfy the real anxiety. He neglects 
 the shadows to reveal the substance of the 
 unseen world. 
 
 Teaching like this is the only kind of teach- Words of 
 ing that will always renew itself, always have 
 something more to bestow upon us. It cannot 
 grow obsolete. It cannot be drained of its sig- 
 nificance. It is like life. Nay, it is life, and it 
 gives life. 
 
 IV 
 
 Let us understand, then, that if our Christi- Loyalty to 
 
 . (, T -, •!••<• J Christ's 
 
 anity is to satisfy our whole nature, it it is to teaching. 
 have its real and full meaning, and power to 
 bring in the kingdom of heaven, it must in- 
 clude this element. We must be as loyal to 
 
198 The Source of Authority 
 
 the teaching of Jesus as we are to His example. 
 We must count no pains too great to spend 
 upon the study of that teaching as it lies in 
 the records, and no effort too severe to make 
 in order that it may be restored in its integ- 
 rity and entirety, rounded and harmonized, 
 within the very centre of our minds. And 
 then we must preach it, simply, sincerely, cer- 
 tainly, as the only doctrine which can lead 
 men out of the intellectual anarchy of doubt 
 into the peaceful realm of truth. 
 The age This is what the age is looking and longing 
 
 authoritij. ^^^' ^^ ^an find no joy in the kingdom of 
 heaven unless it finds there a source of author- 
 ity for the mind as well as for the heart. Au- 
 thority is what the sociologist demands, in order 
 that he may have a sure basis for the precepts 
 of altruism. Authority is what the philosopher 
 seeks, in order that he may have a fixed point 
 of departure and certain limits of speculation. 
 Authority is what the poet craves, as he clings 
 to 
 
 " The truths that never can be pi^oved, 
 
 Until we close with all we loved 
 And all we flow from, soul in soul." ^ 
 
 Men are crying lo here ! and lo there ! We 
 must find the source of authority in an in- 
 
 1 Tennyson, In Memoriam. 
 
The Source of Authority 199 
 
 errant Book, or in an enlightened reason, or 
 in an infallible Church, or perhaps in all three ; 
 as if there could be three sources of one author- 
 ity, or as if a channel could ever be rightly 
 called a source. Let us not hesitate to pass 
 through this confusion of tongues and of ideas, 
 serene and untroubled, with the message of a 
 more excellent way. 
 
 Christ is the Light of all Scripture. Christ C'Am^ is the 
 is the Master of holy reason. Christ is the authority. 
 sole Lord and Life of the true Church. By 
 His word we test all doctrines, conclusions, 
 and commands. On His word we build all 
 faith. This is tlie source of authority in the 
 kingdom of heaven. Let us neither forget 
 nor hesitate to appeal to it always with un- 
 trembling certainty and positive conviction. 
 If Christ did not know and preach the truth, 
 then there is no truth that can be known or 
 preached. Unless we are sure of this, we 
 would better go out of business entirely. It 
 is inconceivable that the loftiest character in 
 history should be the most mistaken man that 
 ^ver thought about the real basis and meaning 
 of life. It is incredible that the noblest life 
 in the world should be founded upon a faith 
 that was vain. It is impossible that a supreme 
 devotion and a real likeness to Christ should 
 
200 The Source of Authority 
 
 have been produced and per]3etuated in the 
 worki without a veritable apprehension of that 
 which He knew and taught concerning God 
 and man. 
 Our great To have this apprehension clearly formed 
 
 His 'creed. witliin US must be our ardent and joyful intel- 
 lectual endeavour. We are not to rest content 
 with the study of single words and separate 
 phrases. The limitations of language, the con- 
 ditions of transmission, will always expose us 
 to error if we follow that course. The truth 
 as it is in Jesus does not lie in fragments, but in 
 the rounded whole. ^ We must get back to 
 the unity and integrity of the thoughts of 
 Jesus, the creed of Christ. The broad outline 
 of His vision of tilings human and divine, the 
 central verities which appear firm and un- 
 changeable in all the reports of His teaching, 
 the point of view from which He discerned 
 and interpreted the mystery of life, — that is 
 what we must seek. And Avhen we find it, 
 we must take our stand there as men who feel 
 the solid ground beneath their feet. Illustra- 
 tions and confirmations we may gather from 
 science and history and philosophy. But the 
 rock of certainty is the mind of Jesus, ex- 
 pressed in His living words and in His speak- 
 ^ See Appendix, note 45. 
 
The Source of Authority 201 
 
 ing life. Beyond this we need not and we 
 cannot go. Here is the ultimatum. This is 
 the truth, we say to men, because Jesus knew 
 it, and said it, and lived it. 
 
 But one thing we may not, we dare not, for- We must 
 get. The condition of apprehending, and how ^^ ^^^^^^ ^.^ 
 much more of preaching, the truth revealed by doctrine. 
 Christ is that we abide in Him. The word of 
 Jesus in the mind of one who does not do the 
 will of Jesus, lies like seed-corn in a mummy's 
 hand. It is only by dwelling with Him and 
 receiving His character. His personality so 
 profoundly, so vitally that it shall be with us 
 as if, in His own words, we had partaken of 
 His flesh and His blood, as if His sacred 
 humanity had been interwoven with the very 
 fibres of our heart and pulsed with secret power 
 in all our veins, — it is thus only that we can 
 be enabled to see His teaching as it is, and set 
 it forth with luminous conviction to the souls 
 of men. 
 
 And if ever we ourselves become afraid of Return to 
 
 Jesus. 
 our own task, and shrink from it ; if the scep- 
 ticism of our age appalls us and chills us to the 
 very marrow ; if Ave question whether a gospel 
 so simple, so absolute, as that which is com- 
 mitted to us can find acceptance in such a 
 world, at such a time as this, — be sure it is 
 
202 The Source of Authority 
 
 because we have gotten out of fellowship with 
 Him who is our Peace and our Hope, our Light 
 and our Strength. A Cliristless man can never 
 preach Christ. We have been anxious and 
 troubled about many things, and have forgot- 
 ten the one thing needful. Peace we must have 
 before we can have power. Let us straight- 
 way return, in prayer, in meditation, in trust, 
 in faithful simple-hearted obedience, to Him 
 who is the only centre of Peace because He is 
 the only source of authority. 
 
 " I have a life in Christ to live, 
 
 But ere I live it must I wait 
 Till learning can clear answer give 
 
 Of this and that book's date? 
 I have a life in Christ to live, 
 
 I have a death in Christ to die ; — 
 And must I wait till science give 
 
 All doubts a full reply? 
 
 Nay, rather, while the sea of doubt 
 
 Is raging wildly round about, 
 
 Questioning of life and death and sin, 
 
 Let me but creep within 
 
 Thy fold, O Christ, and at Thy feet 
 
 Take but the lowest seat, 
 
 And hear Thine awful voice repeat 
 
 In gentlest accents, heavenly sweet, 
 
 Come unto IMe and rest ; 
 
 Believe Me, and be blest." ^ 
 
 1 John Campbell Shairp. 
 
VI 
 LIBERTY 
 
" But, perfect in every part, 
 
 Has the potter's moulded shape 
 Leap of man's quickened heart. 
 
 Throe of his thought's escape, 
 Stings of his soul which dart 
 
 " Through the barrier of flesh, till keen 
 She climbs from the calm and clear 
 
 Through turbidity all between 
 
 From the known to the unknown here. 
 
 Heaven's ' Shall be,' from Earth's ' Has been '? 
 
 " Then life is — to wake and not sleep. 
 
 Rise and not rest, but press 
 From earth's level where blindly creep 
 
 Things perfected, more or less, 
 To the heaven's height, far and steep, 
 
 " Where, amid what strifes and storms 
 May wait the adventurous quest. 
 Power is Love — transports, transforms 
 
 Who aspired from worst to best. 
 Sought the soul's world, spurned the worms.' " 
 
 — Robert Browning, Reverie. 
 
VI 
 LIBERTY 
 
 There are three x^oints at which the teach- Three great 
 
 , , , problems. 
 
 ing of Jesus comes into closest contact with the 
 needs of the present age. Three problems of 
 profound difficulty are pressing to-day upon all 
 thoughtful men: the psychological problem of 
 the freedom of the will; the theological prob- 
 lem of the actual relation of God to the uni- 
 verse ; and the moral problem of man's duty 
 to his fellow-men in a world of inequality. 
 Out of the depths of these problems dark and 
 multitudinous doubts are forever rising, like 
 the clouds of smoke and steam which issue from 
 the labouring bosom of Vesuvius, wdiile sub- 
 terranean thunder is muttering and rolling 
 underneath. Most of the intellectual perplex- 
 ities and practical perils of our times come 
 directly from these questions, to which modern 
 scepticism gives an answer of despair, or at 
 best only a dubious and uncertain reply. 
 
 But the gospel of Christ, rightly appre- 
 hended and interpreted, offers us a solution 
 205 
 
206 
 
 Liberty 
 
 Three great of these problems whicli is full of liglit and 
 eru sover-' l^op^ and moral certainty. There is a breath 
 eignty, and of the Spirit in His teaching, pure and strong, 
 pouring like a clean wind out of heaven, to 
 scoff away the obscuring vapours, and reveal the 
 changeless verities and glories of the spiritual 
 landscape. Three truths emerge in His doc- 
 trine, and stand out clear and sharp as moun- 
 tain peaks against the blue : the truth of 
 human liberty, the truth of Divine sovereignty, 
 and the truth of universal service. Of these 
 three truths we must never lose sight, if our 
 thinking is to be in accordance with the mind 
 of Jesus. To these three truths we must bear 
 witness, unhesitatingly, faithfully, and joy- 
 fully, if our preaching is to be a gospel for 
 this age of doubt. 
 
 Modern fa- 
 talism. 
 
 No one who has looked steadily upon the 
 face of modern life as it is reflected in popular 
 literature can doubt that it is '' sicklied o'er " 
 with the dark shadow of fatalism. It is evident 
 in the writings of the learned and in the scrib- 
 blings of the ignorant. Everywhere there is a 
 tendency to explain the whole life of man as 
 the product of heredity and environment. The 
 student of physiology, tracing the strange and 
 
Liberty 207 
 
 subtle correspondence between the processes of 
 consciousness and the changes and movements 
 of the nervous system, makes the enormous 
 assumption that the correspondence amounts to 
 identity. All the hopes and fears, all the affec- 
 tions and aspirations, which glorify this mortal 
 life, are in their last analysis the result of cer- 
 tain puckerings and tintinnabulations of the 
 gray matter of the nerves. The actions which 
 flow from them are as necessary as the fall of 
 an apple when the stem is broken. The caress 
 which a mother gives to her child, and the blow 
 with which a murderer strikes his victim dead, 
 are equally automatic and inevitable. They are 
 the motions of delicately constructed puppets, 
 and the triumph of modern investigation is the 
 discovery of the string which moves them and 
 the forces which pull it. 
 
 It is true that many of the teachers who steer Materialism 
 
 1 1 , 1 xi • 1 disavowed 
 
 US, more or less openly, towards this conclu- i^fff^^gji^ 
 sion are careful to disavow the idea that they 
 are teaching materialism. The name is highly 
 unpopular at the present moment, and there 
 is hardly one of the men of science of to-day 
 who has not protested with indignation that 
 no one should dare to call him a materialist. 
 They have devised subtle theories of some- 
 thing called ''mind-stuff" which they hold, 
 
208 Liberty 
 
 with W. K. Clifford, " is the reality which we 
 perceive as matter." They distinguish, with 
 Huxley, between matter and force, and a third 
 thing which they call consciousness and Avhich 
 they admit cannot conceivably be a modifi- 
 cation of eitlier of the first two things ; but 
 they go on to say tliat " what we call the 
 operations of the mind are functions of tlie 
 brain, and the materials of consciousness are 
 j^roducts of cerebral activity." ^ In short, they 
 give a materialistic explanation of the origin 
 and processes of thought, and then protect 
 themselves against the imputation of being 
 materialists, by solemnly averring that they 
 have not the slightest idea of what matter 
 really is, nor the slightest intention of sug- 
 gesting that it has any resemblance to the 
 so-called mental operations which are prob- 
 ably produced by one of its own forms of 
 activity. 
 Responsibii- A scheme like this certainly has no room for 
 Q^f^ free-will or personal responsibility. It makes 
 
 a man's character and action entirely depen- 
 dent upon the amount and quality of nervous 
 energy that has been transmitted to him by his 
 ancestors and developed by the circumstances 
 of his life. He lives, as Professor Tyndall 
 1 T. H. Huxley, in The Fortnightly Review, vol. xi., 703. 
 
Liherty . 209 
 
 says, in a realm of " physical and moral neces- 
 sity," — though why he should be at pains to 
 say "moral," I can hardly conceive. One ad- 
 jective would serve as well as two, when they 
 both mean the same thing. It requires but 
 a little exercise of this nervous energy on our 
 part, in the form of imagination, to trace it back 
 to its previous form of heat stored up in cer- 
 tain hundredweights of food and appropriated 
 by digestion. From this point our cerebral 
 activity skips lightly and altogether without 
 volition along the various lines of animal and 
 vegetable life, of chemical and physical trans- 
 formations of energy, until we arrive at the 
 idea of the sun. From this idea a certain un- 
 controllable change in the gray substance of 
 our brain produces the further notion that 
 the arrangement of certain quantities of mat- 
 ter and force Avhich took place in some in- 
 explicable way long before the birth of the 
 solar system was really the thing that settled 
 the question whether you and I should prefer 
 telling the truth to lying, — if we do. Indeed, 
 there never has been any question at all about 
 it; it Avas fixed from the beginning. We have 
 no more responsibility for it than we have for 
 the colour of our eyes or the shape of our 
 noses. 
 
210 
 
 Liberty 
 
 " Thoughts 
 of an Au- 
 tomaton.^' 
 
 I have found a brief and explicit statement 
 of the position to which this method of think- 
 ing forces those who follow it, in an article 
 ironically entitled " Thoughts of a Human Au- 
 tomaton" in a recent English periodical. ^ 
 
 " I am an automaton — a puppet dangling on 
 my distinctive wire, Avhicli Fate holds with an 
 unrelaxing grip. I am not different, nor do I 
 feel differently, from my fellow-=men, but my 
 eyes refuse to blink away the truth, which is, 
 that I am an automatic machine, a piece of 
 clockwork wound up to go for an allotted time, 
 smoothly or otherwise, as the efficiency of the 
 machinery may determine. Free-will is a myth 
 invented by man to satisfy his emotions, not 
 his reason. I feel as if I were free, as if I Avere 
 responsible for my thoughts and actions, just 
 as a person under the influence of hypnotism 
 believes he is free to do as lie pleases. But he 
 is not ; nor am I. If it were once possible for 
 a rational being to question this fact, the dis- 
 coveries of Darwin must have set his doubts at 
 rest. . . . 
 
 " What is crime ? A crime is an action 
 threatened by the law with punishment, says 
 Kant ; and freedom of action or free-will 
 
 1 Henry Beaucliamp, in The Fortnightly Review^ English 
 edition, Marcli, 1892. 
 
Liberty 211 
 
 is a legally necessary condition of crime. But 
 the law of heredity conclusively demonstrates 
 that free-will and freedom of action stand in 
 the category of lively imaginings. Therefore 
 crime, as the law understands it, is non-existent, 
 since no imputability can be recognized when a 
 man is not responsible for his actions. There- 
 fore the law is not justified in inflicting pun- 
 ishment. . . . 
 
 " Briefly to conclude. Religion can no more 
 mix with science than oil with water. Science 
 acknowledges no necessity for the existence of 
 religion, and finally severs the bonds between 
 morality and religion. Morality, altogether 
 independent of religion, is entirely based upon 
 self-interest. The suj^posed connection between 
 religion and morality is an illusion most per- 
 nicious to the general welfare and advance 
 of mankind. Keligion, as a superfluity, should 
 be excluded from all educational institutions. 
 Its place will be supplied by the creed of scien- 
 tific philosophy — Determinism. The primary 
 jDrinciple of Determinism, namely, that a human 
 being is an automaton, and therefore not respon- 
 sible for his thoughts or his acts, taken together 
 with its corollaries, more than suffices for every 
 intellectual need hitherto provided for by re- 
 ligion. For the two great factors in the value 
 
212 Liberty 
 
 of religion are its ethics and its sedative prop- 
 erties, and in both these uses Determinism 
 displays overwhelming intellectual superiority. 
 Its ethics are more universal and its consolation 
 more assured ; for they both rest on irrefraga- 
 ble scientific truth. The Determinist is con- 
 sequently never harassed by doubts — the Rock 
 of Ages is fragile compared with the adaman- 
 tine foundation of his creed." 
 The creed of This curious claim of an automaton to have 
 a " creed " Avould be deliciously humorous, if 
 it were not so unutterably sad, and so detest- 
 ably dangerous. For though, as a matter of 
 fact, there are few men who will make, even 
 under an assumed name, such a candid con- 
 fession of faith in their own moral non-entity 
 as that which we have just read, there are many 
 men who are, consciously or unconsciously, 
 preaching the same black creed of Necessity 
 in the subtle forms of literary art, and multi- 
 tudes who are silently accepting it as gospel 
 truth. Fatalism broods over modern fiction 
 and the modern drama like a huge, shapeless 
 spectre; and its influence is felt in all the 
 judgments and conceptions and unspoken but 
 clearly revealed sentiments of a society which 
 finds its chief intellectual pabulum in novels 
 and plays 
 
Liberty 213 
 
 Here is the famous French realist, Zola, of ''The 
 whose books it is said that enough have been ^"'""f, 
 
 ^ Beast." 
 
 sold to build a pile as high as the Eiffel tower. 
 He writes a novel called La Bete Humaine, in 
 which he shows how unswervingly the lines of 
 evil run through the plan of life. He describes 
 seven inevitable murders, occurring within eigh- 
 teen months in close connection with a certain 
 fated house, and closes his book with the descrip- 
 tion of a railway train, crowded with soldiers, 
 dragged by an engine whose driver has been 
 killed, dashing at headlong speed into the mid- 
 night. The train is the world ; we are the 
 freight ; fate is the track ; death is the dark- 
 ness ; God is the engineer, — who is dead.^ 
 
 Here is the leader of the Dutch Sensitivists, ''Footsteps 
 Louis Couperus, who writes a romance called 
 Noodlot^ " Destmy,'' in which four human lives 
 are tangled together in an inextricable and hor- 
 rible coil. One of his characters pauses for an 
 instant in the shameful career to which he is 
 impelled. " He threw himself back in his chair, 
 still feebly wringing his hands, and the tears 
 trickled again and again down his cheeks. He 
 saw his own cowardice take shape before him. 
 He stared into its frightened eyes, and he did 
 not condemn it. For he was as fate had made 
 1 See Appendix, note 46. 
 
214 
 
 Liberty 
 
 'Ghosts. 
 
 The small 
 fatalists. 
 
 him. He was a craven, and lie could not help 
 it. Men called such an one as he a coward ; it 
 was but a word. Why coward, or simple and 
 brave, or good and noble ? It was all a matter 
 of convention, of accepted meaning ; the whole 
 world was mere convention, a concept, an illu- 
 sion of the brain. There was notliing real at 
 all — nothing ! "i 
 
 Here is the Norse dramatist, Ibsen, — the 
 new Shakespeare by the grace of heredity. He 
 writes a drama of life which he calls Ghosts, 
 and shows how every player is haunted by dead 
 ancestors who look through his eyes, speak in 
 his words, and act in his deeds. Echoes of 
 spent passion, shreds and patches of worn-out 
 sin, rags and tatters of the past, — that is the 
 stuff of which life is fabricated, like a piece of 
 shoddy cloth, in the great mill of circumstance 
 which stands on the banks of the river of time 
 and turns out the shabby lives of men and 
 women. 2 
 
 Nor is this view of life confined to the great 
 foreign masters of realism. It pervades almost 
 all the minor schools of fiction ; it diffuses it- 
 self insensibly through the work of the feeble 
 and fatuous imitators. A keen and wholesome 
 
 1 Louis Couperus, The Footsteps of Fate (New York, 
 Appletons), p. 05. '-^ See Appendix, note 47. 
 
Liberty 215 
 
 critic of our own literature, Mr. Charles Dudley 
 Warner, put his finger upon the fact when he 
 wrote : " It has come about that the novels and 
 stories which are to fill our leisure hours and 
 cheer us in this vale of tears have become what 
 we call tragic. It is not easy to define what 
 tragedy is, but the term is applied in modern 
 fiction to scenes and characters that come to 
 ruin from no particular fault of their own, — 
 not even when the characters break most of the 
 ten commandments, — but by an unappeasable 
 fate that dogs and thwarts them. This is the 
 romance of fatality, and if it is tragedy, it is 
 the tragedy of fatalism." ^ 
 
 It is not j)0ssible that such a theory of ex- 
 istence should prevail without bringing sadness Melancholy 
 and heaviness into the hearts of men. The 
 modern melancholy of which we spoke in the 
 first lecture is largely the result of this gen- 
 eral s ense o f a godless predestination. It is 
 Calvinism with the bottom knocked out. It 
 robs life of all interest, of all joy, of all en- 
 thusiasm. Was it morphine that drove Guy de 
 Maupassant, the most brilliant of the younger 
 French novelists, to insanity ? Or was it his 
 philosophy that drove him to morphine as a 
 refuge from the despair and ugliness of exist- 
 1 See Appendix, note 48. 
 
216 Liberty 
 
 ence ? Pessimism exudes from fatalism like 
 sepia from the cuttlefish. ^ What could be 
 more dispiriting than to doubt the reality of 
 all effort, to deny the possibility of self -con- 
 quest and triumph over circumstances, to find 
 heroism an illusion and virtue a dream? What 
 could break the spring of life more completely 
 than to feel that our feet are tangled in a net 
 whose meshes were woven for us by our ances- 
 tors, and for them by tailless apes, and for them 
 by gilled amphibians, and for them by gliding 
 worms, and for them by ciliated larvae, and for 
 them by amcebse, and for them by God does 
 not know what ? ^ It does not help the case 
 in the least to do as some theoloo^ians have 
 tried to do and bring back into the theory by 
 the aid of certain misconstrued and very 
 much overworked j)assages of Scripture, the 
 idea of a supreme Deity Avho has constructed 
 the loom and devised the pattern of the net 
 and decreed the weaving of every loop. The 
 chain of Fate is not made less heavy by fasten- 
 ing the end of it to the distant throne of an 
 omnipotent and impassive Creator. If our 
 false sense of freedom comes from such a Be- 
 ing, who is Himself free, it is all the more a 
 cruel and bitter enigma. If moral responsi- 
 1 See Appendix, note 40. 2 gee Appendix, note 50. 
 
Liberty 217 
 
 bility has been imposed upon us by the same 
 hand which has bound us to an inalterable 
 destiny, it is all the more a crushing and mis- 
 erable fraud. To baptize fatalism Avith a Baptized 
 
 , ., . fatalism. 
 
 Christian name does not change its nature. 
 
 To hold fast to the metaphysical conception of 
 God while accepting Heredity and Environment 
 as His only and infallible prophets is simply to 
 add a new ethical horror to the dismal delusion 
 of life, and to revolt to the pessimism of Omar 
 Khayyam. 
 
 " We are no other than a moving row 
 Of Magic Shadow-shapes, that coine and go 
 Kound with this Snn-iUumined Lantern, held 
 In Midnight by the Master of the Show ; 
 
 " Impotent Pieces of the Game He plays 
 Upon this Checker-board of Nights and Days; 
 Hither and thither moves, and checks, and slays, 
 And one by one back in the Closet lays. 
 
 " The Moving Finger writes ; and, having writ, 
 Moves on ; nor all your Piety nor wit 
 Shall lure it back to cancel lialf a Line, 
 Nor all your tears wash out a Word of it. 
 
 " And that inverted Bowl they call the Sky, 
 Whereunder crawling coop'd we live and die, 
 Lift not your hands to It for help— for it 
 As impotently rolls as you or I."i 
 
 1 Buhaiydt of Omar Khayyam. Rendered into English 
 verse by Edward Fitzgerald, with an accompaniment of draw- 
 ings by Elihu Vedder (Boston, 188-4), stanzas 72, 73, 75, 76. 
 
218 
 
 Liberty 
 
 II 
 
 Is determin- 
 ism proved ? 
 
 Philosophy 
 says 710. 
 
 This is the solution which modern positivism, 
 christened or unchristened, offers for the prob- 
 lem of the freedom of the will. Before we 
 turn to consider the very different answer 
 which Christ gives to the same question, let 
 us stay for a moment to ask whether this 
 current and popular solution is of tlie nature 
 of a demonstration, or of the nature of a doubt. 
 Is it so clearly proven that science forces us 
 to accept determinism ? Or is it an unveri- 
 fiable assumption, which is made under tlie 
 influence of a general scepticism in regard to 
 spiritual realities, and which leaves out of 
 view quite as many and quite as important 
 facts as those which it professes to explain? 
 Are we compelled to admit it ; or is it only one 
 of two alternatives, neither of which is scientifi- 
 cally demonstrable, so that the choice between 
 them must rest upon other considerations? 
 
 I do not hesitate to say that the whole weight 
 of sober and sane criticism inclines to the lat- 
 ter conclusion. Determinism has not yet been 
 established either by physiological, psychologi- 
 cal, or metaphysical argument. 
 
 The common assumption that the abstract 
 reasoning of Jonathan Edwards against the 
 
Liberty 219 
 
 liberty of the will has never been and cannoc 
 be refuted, is based upon ignorance of the facts. 
 An American philosopher, Mr. Rowland Haz- 
 ard, has ansAvered it with great clearness and 
 force. Professor George P. Fisher says : " The 
 fundamental point of Mr. Hazard's criticism 
 of Edwards is fully established. It must be 
 allowed that his confutation of that conception 
 of the wdll which underlies the reasoning of the 
 great theologian is sound and conclusive."^ 
 
 The support which modern science is sup- Science sctys 
 posed to give to the theory of determinism 
 turns out, upon closer examination, to be alto- 
 gether illusory. The soundest and most care- 
 ful investigators utterly decline to commit 
 themselves to that metaphysical dogma, or to 
 bind out science as a maid-of-all-work in the 
 service of fatalistic theology. 
 
 The most distinguished of living English Free-ioUia 
 scientists recently said : " The influence of jj^iracie. 
 animal or vegetable life on matter is infinitely 
 beyond the range of any scientific inquiry 
 hitherto entered on. Its power of directing 
 the motions of moving particles, in the demon- 
 strated daily miracle of our human free-ivill^ and 
 
 1 Rowland Hazard, Freedom of 3Iind in Willing (Boston, 
 Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1889). Introduction by George P. 
 Eislier, p. xxxi. 
 
220 Liberty 
 
 in the growth of generation after generation of 
 plants from a single seed, are infinitely dif- 
 ferent from any possible resnlt of the fortui- 
 tous concourse of atoms. The real phenomena 
 of life infinitely transcend human science." ^ 
 The theory that consciousness is a function of 
 the brain breaks down completely when it 
 attempts to explain the phenomena of sleep. 
 Why should all the other functions of the 
 body be carried on without fatigue and Avith- 
 out interruption while this alone demands rest 
 and admits of intervals of cessation ? If con- 
 sciousness is a function of nerve-matter, sleep 
 abolishes it. How does it come back again 
 without losing the sense of personal identity? 
 Thought is Is it Conceivable that the highest character, 
 the loftiest genius, is purely an intermittent 
 secretion of certain nerve-cells, and that dur- 
 ing the hours of sleep, embracing one-third of 
 its entire history, it is absolutely non-existent ? 
 '' Function," says an eminent neurologist, " is 
 a physiological term, and it is, I submit, im- 
 proper to speak of states of consciousness as 
 being functions of the brain. ... It is not 
 the mind, but the physical basis of mind, which 
 is a product of physical evolution. It is the 
 
 1 Lord Kelvin (Sir William Thomson), in The Fortnightly 
 Hevieio, March, 1892. 
 
 not a secre- 
 tion. 
 
the organ of 
 the mind. 
 
 Liberty 221 
 
 organ of mind, not the mind of itself, wliich 
 being an evolution out of the rest of the body 
 is representative of it."^ 
 
 The fact that the brain is a double organ, — The brain 
 that there are really two brains, only one of 
 which is used, — cannot be explained on the 
 theory that consciousness is merely the result 
 of the vibration of nerve filaments, as the music 
 of the JEolian harp is the result of the pas- 
 sage of the wind over its strings. A distin- 
 guished physiologist has cleverly shown that if 
 this Avere the case a double brain would mean 
 a double amount of thought, just as twice the 
 number of strings would mean twice the quan- 
 tity of music. 2 But the fact that this is not so, 
 points clearly to the hyj^othesis that the brain 
 is not an ^olian harp helplessly vibrating 
 under external impulses, but a double organ 
 with two sets of keys, and the mind is like the 
 player who can use either one of them to make 
 the music. And this corresponds closely with 
 our own sense of the process. For we are 
 conscious not only of passive thoughts and 
 
 1 Dr. J. Hughlings Jackson, "Lecture on the Comparative 
 Study of Diseases of the Nervous System " (British Medical 
 Journal, August 17, 1889). 
 
 2 Dr. William H. Thomson, Materialism and Modern 
 Fhysiologij of the Nervous System (New York, Putnams, 
 1892), pp. S3 if. 
 
222 Liberty 
 
 feelings, evoked witliin us by external causes, 
 but also of thoughts and feelings voluntarily 
 directed and combined, woven together in crea- 
 tive harmonies, and moving under the guidance 
 of chosen ideals towards a symphonic complete- 
 ness. Even the sense of discord and conflict 
 which often rises within us is an evidence that 
 there is a player as well as an instrument. For 
 it is inconceivable that an ^olian harp, ill- 
 strung, should dislike its own bad music, and 
 endeavour, or think that it could endeavour, to 
 make a better, sweeter sound. 
 Hereditijnot Heredity is undoubtedly a real and power- 
 ful force. It supplies the outfit of life. But 
 does it determine the use which we shall make 
 of it ? The very extension of the doctrine 
 by the investigations of science dissolves this 
 narrow and absolute conclusion. We inherit 
 from thousands, from hundreds of thousands, 
 of ancestors. The blood of many families and 
 tribes and races is mingled in our veins. 
 What is it that decides which of these many 
 lines we shall follow ? It must be either blind 
 chance or free choice. All the phenomena of 
 society, all the facts of consciousness, are in 
 favour of the latter supposition. We see men 
 whose heritage is of the lowest and the worst, 
 working their way up, by sheer strength of 
 
 final. 
 
Liberty 228 
 
 moral choice and effort, to a higher plane. ^ 
 
 We see men whose heritage is of the loftiest 
 
 and the best, declining 
 
 "thro' acted crime, 
 Or seeming-genial venial fault, 
 Recm-ring and suggesting still," 2 
 
 to the very depths of infamy. It is true that 
 a man cannot bring out of himself anything 
 that is not already there. But it is true also, 
 by virtue of heredity, that there are many 
 potential men in every man, and which of them 
 is to emerge, he chooses for himself by a thou- 
 sand silent moral preferences ; by yielding or 
 by resisting; by the cowardice and corruption, 
 or by the courage and purification of his own 
 free-will. 
 
 Even those who write of human life from a Moral judg- 
 professedly naturalistic stand]:)oint cannot pfet ^^^^'^^^ 
 
 ^ J 10 assume 
 
 rid of this conviction. Take Zola, for examjjle. liberty. 
 If he were consistent, he would speak with 
 equal and impassive coldness of all his charac- 
 ters, tangled together in the inextricable toils 
 of heredity. But he cannot help letting his 
 hatred and contempt for the selfish, the luxu- 
 rious, the vicious, express itself in the very 
 accent with whicli he describes them. He 
 cannot help showing his admiration and affec- 
 1 See Appendix, note 51. ^ Tennyson, [Will.'] 
 
224 Liberty 
 
 tion for those who, like Denise and Doctor 
 Pascal^ and Clotilde, rise out of the infamy 
 which envelops the family Rougo7i-Macquart. 
 Virtue and vice may be scientifically treated 
 as if they were merely natural products like 
 sugar and vitriol ; but when we come to talk 
 of them from a human and humane standpoint, 
 there is something within us which demands 
 that we shall recognize a merit in being virt- 
 uous, and a shame in being vicious, — qualities 
 which can never belong to mere secretions, 
 whether of plants or of nerves, — qualities 
 which have no possible meaning • unless there 
 is a free-will in man, capable of choosing be- 
 tween the evil and the good. 
 
 Now that a free-will is possible, modern psy- 
 chology assures us, as the result of its latest re- 
 psijchology. searches. It does not attempt to demonstrate 
 the existence of such a power by physiological 
 investigation. It confesses that this demon- 
 stration is impossible with our present know- 
 ledge. But it declares with equal candour that 
 the contrary attempt to show that the sense of 
 freedom is a delusion, is inconclusive. '' The 
 last word of psychology here," says Professor 
 William James, " is ignorance, for the forces 
 engaged are too delicate and numerous to be 
 followed in d.etaiL" He points out the ex- 
 
 The testi 
 mo7iy of 
 modern 
 
Liberty 225 
 
 tremely reckless and inconsequent nature of 
 the reasoning by which the determinists seek 
 to make mere analogies draAvn from the course 
 of rivers, and reflex actions, and other material 
 phenomena, serve as proofs that the will is a 
 mechanical effect. He ex]30ses the bold as- 
 sumption by which they ignore the testimony 
 of consciousness in the presence of feeling and 
 effort. He shows that the utmost which any 
 argument for determinism can do is to present 
 a possible hypothesis, which a man who has 
 already determined to hold fast to the idea 
 that the whole universe is one chain of inevi- 
 table causation may accept if he likes. But 
 meanwhile the other alternative stands equally 
 open. The moral arguments all point in that 
 direction. The only course, in such a situa- Free-wUHs 
 tion, is voluntary choice. "For scepticism it- ^^^^^^ 
 self, if systematic, is also voluntary choice. If, 
 meanwhile, the will be indetermined, it would 
 seem only fitting that the belief in its inde- 
 termination should be voluntarily chosen from 
 amongst other possible beliefs. Freedom's 
 first deed should be to affirm itself. . . . 
 Thus not only our morality but our religion, 
 so far as the latter is deliberate, depends on 
 the effort Avhich we can make. ^Will you or 
 wonH you have it so ? ' is the most probing 
 
 Q 
 
226 Liberty 
 
 question we are ever asked : we are asked it 
 every hour of the day, and about the largest 
 as well as the smallest, the most theoretical as 
 well as the most practical, things. We answer 
 by conseyits or non-consents^ and not by words. 
 What wonder if these dumb responses should 
 seem our deepest organs of communication 
 with the nature of things ! What wonder if 
 the effort demanded by them should be the 
 measure of our worth as men ! What wonder 
 if the amount which we accord of it be the 
 one strictly underived and original contribu- 
 tion which we make to the world ! " ^ 
 
 III 
 
 Christ says Here, then, modern science, careful, exact, 
 
 liberty is , t j • • i i j« i 
 
 real reverent, as distinguished irom modern scep- 
 
 ticism, leaves us before the two doors. And 
 here Christ comes to us, calling us to enter 
 through the door of liberty into the pathway of 
 eternal life. "Ask, and it shall be given you; 
 seek and ye shall find; knock and it shall be 
 opened unto you."^ "If any man willeth to 
 do His will, he shall know of the teaching. "^ 
 
 1 William James, Psychology, vol. ii., p. 579. See Ap- 
 pendix, note 52. 
 
 2 St. Matt. vii. 7. s St John vii. 17. 
 
Liberty 227 
 
 The w hole life and_ mmistry of Jesus is a ^^^^ ^^f^ ^f 
 revelation of moral freedom. i H is entranc e revelation oj 
 into the world was voluntary. His continu- Me-wiii. 
 ance in j iuman life was voluntary. His death 
 was voluntary. At the first crisis of His rife~TL_ 
 He chose to go about His Father's business. 
 In the temptation He chose to resist the allure- 
 ments of the Evil One. On the way to the 
 cross He chose not to call on God for the 
 deliverance wdiich He knew would come in 
 answer to His call. He was, indeed, fulfilling ^"^^ 
 an appointed task, treading the path which 
 had been marked out for the feet of the 
 Christ ; b^utJHe was fulfilling the task freely; 
 He was walking in liberty because He loved 
 to do the will of God. The triumph of His 
 virtue lay in the freedom of His choice. 
 
 There was a singular propriety in the text of Thepreach- 
 His first public discourse. It Avas a declaration ^alospeTof' 
 of liberty, as well as of grace. It was an eman- Hherty. 
 cipation proclamation as well as a gospel of com- 
 fort and hel23. '' The spirit of the Lord is upon d-^ 
 me, because He anointed me to preach good 
 tidings to the poor; He hath sent me to pro- 
 claim release to the captives, and recovering of 
 sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that 
 are crushed, to j^roclaim the acceptable year of 
 1 See Appendix, note 53. 
 
228 Liberty 
 
 the Lord."! And what was the oppressive 
 bondage from which He proclaimed release? 
 Was it not the tyranny of a false doctrine of 
 necessity over the minds of men, as well as the 
 enslaving influence of sin over their inert and 
 hopeless wills? 
 The Fhari- Here were the s cribes and Pharisees teach- 
 Fate. ' ^^^o ^^^'^^ ^^^® whole world was divided into 
 two classes, — the chosen and the not-chosen, the 
 righteous for whom salvation was secure what- 
 ever they might do, and the sinners for whom 
 salvation was impossible whatever they might 
 do. Here were the outcast, the lost, the neg- 
 lected, shut out, by no choice of their own, but 
 by their birth, by the occupations in which 
 they were engaged, by their ignorance, by the 
 very conditions of their life, from all part in 
 the kingdom of heaven as the scribes and 
 Pharisees conceived it ; not only the harlots 
 and the publicans, but also Am Haarez^ "the 
 people of the land," with Avhom it was not fit- 
 ting tliat a righteous person should have any 
 dealings ; ^ miserable souls, bound by inheri- 
 tance to a desperate and unhallowed fate. Here 
 came Jesus, taking His way directly to these 
 r lost ones, these outsiders, and telling them that 
 all this doctrine of inevitable doom was a chain 
 1 St. Luke iv. 18. 2 Bruce, Kingdom of God, 145. 
 
Liberty 229 
 
 of lies, breaking the imaginary fetters from Jesus taught 
 their souls and assuring them by His first 
 word that they were free, even though they 
 were ignorant of it. "Repent," He cried, "for 
 the kingdom of heaven has approached unto 
 you."i "Except ye be converted and become 
 as little children, ye shall not enter into the 
 kingdom of heaven. "^ And what is the signifi- 
 cance of these words, "repentance" and "con- 
 version," — their real significance, I mean, not 
 that which has been read into them by centuries 
 of false and formal theology? They are not 
 passive and involuntary words ; they do not rest 
 upon the idea of qualifications which may or 
 may not be in the possession of those to whom 
 Christ speaks. They are active words, — words 
 of iuAvard movement and exertion. " Repent " 
 means change your mind ; make that simple 
 effort of the soul for internal change which 
 is the ultimate act of the free will ; ^ put forth 
 
 1 St. Matt. iv. 17. 
 
 2 St. Matt, xviii. 3. 
 
 3 " Every intelligent being, capable of conceiving of higher 
 ethical conditions than he has yet attained, has in his own 
 moral nature for the exercise of his creative powers an infi- 
 nite sphere, within which ... he is the supreme disposer. 
 ... A man who does not want to be pure and noble, may yet 
 begin one step lower in the scale of moral advancement, with 
 the wish to want to be pure and noble ; and, here commenc- 
 ing the cultivation of his moral nature, ascend from this lower 
 
free 
 
 230 Liberty 
 
 that power of fixed attention to tlie new motive 
 which is the central essence of liberty and the 
 creative force of the soul.^ "Be converted," 
 as Christ spoke the word, is not passive ; it 
 expresses an action exercised by the soul within 
 itself ; it means simply '' turn around " ; set 
 yourse lf in a new relat ion to God, to_ truth, to 
 Faith IS virtue. The name of this relation is faith. 
 " Believe " is Chris t's great wo rd. It is the 
 '• open sesame " of the kingdom. " Believe in 
 God, believe also in Me." ^ " He that believeth 
 hath everlasting life." ^ "All things are possible 
 to him that believeth." * But it is never spoken 
 of as a mere intellectual opmion, or emotional 
 experience, an irresistible conviction wrought 
 by external evidence in the mind, or bestowed 
 without effort upon the soul. The Bible never 
 says that faith is a gift. There is a voluntary 
 element in it. It is something to be done by ^ 
 the exercise of an inward power. It is a com- 
 ing of the soul to Christ ; it is a following of the 
 
 point, through the want to be pure and noble, to the free effort 
 to gratify this want." — Rowland Hazard, Freedom oj 
 Mind in Willing, "Of Effort for Internal Change" (Bos- 
 ton, Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1889), chap. xiv. 
 
 1 "The essential achievement of the will when it is most 
 ' voluntary,' is to attend to a difficult object and hold it fast 
 before the mind." — James, Psychology, vol. ii., p. 561. 
 
 2 St. John xiv. 1. 3 gt. John vi. 47. ^ gt. Mark ix. 23. 
 
Liberty 231 
 
 soul after Him ; it is the first step in a long 
 course of spiritual activity. It is a deed. The 
 disciples said unto Christ, " What must we do 
 that we may work the works of God ? " Jesus 
 answered, " This is the work of God, that ye 
 believe on Him whom He hath sent."^ 
 
 Now there is not a hint in all the teaching of All may 
 Jesus that this first act of freedom is impossible 
 for any soul to whom He speaks. He has no 
 idea of an eternal predestination binding some to 
 belief and others to unbelief, a secret decree in- 
 cluding certain men in the kingdom and exclud- 
 ing others from all possibility of entering into it. 
 It is true that He says, " No man can come unto 
 Me except the Father draw him"; ^ but what He 
 means by this drawing He tells us in the par- 
 able of the Lost Son, where it is the simple 
 knowledge of the Father's abundant love that 
 draws the prodigal back from the far country 
 of sin;^ and in the parable of the Publican in 
 the Temple, * when it is the sense of the Divine 
 mercy and forgiveness that makes the outcast 
 man cry, "God, be merciful to me a sinner." 
 There is prevenient grace in the doctrine of 
 Jesus. But the grace is there. It has already 
 come. All that man has to do is to meet it, to 
 
 1 St. John vi. 28, 29. ^ st. Luke xv. 
 
 2 St. John vi. 44. * St. Luke xviii. 10-14. 
 
232 
 
 Liberty 
 
 Christ is 
 God's call 
 to faith. 
 
 iVo predesti- 
 nation to 
 death. 
 
 put himself into the upward swing of it, that it 
 may lift and help him heavenward. 
 
 A calling and a choosing by God are neces- 
 sary before any man can be saved. But Jesus 
 does not speak of this choosing and calling as 
 eternal. Christ Himself is the call, and all 
 Avho answer it are chosen. '^ If any man thirst, 
 let him come unto Me and drink. "^ ''Him that 
 Cometh unto Me I Avill in nowise cast out."^ 
 The heavenly invitation is set forth in all its 
 generosity and sincerity in the story of the 
 Marriage Feast. ^ The bidding went out into 
 the highways and hedges, to the bad and to the 
 good; and all who heard and accepted it w^ere 
 welcome. And if a single guest was turned 
 away, it was only because his own conduct 
 showed that he had not really taken the invi- 
 tation honestly and accepted willingly all that 
 was provided for him. 
 
 There is not a single word in all that Jesus 
 said to suggest any other reason than this for 
 the exclusion of a single person from the bless- 
 ings of the kingdom. " Ye will not come unto 
 Me that ye might have life."* "How often 
 would I have gathered thy children together 
 even as a hen gathereth her chickens under 
 
 1 St. John vii. 37. 
 
 2 St. John vi. 37. 
 
 St. Matt. xxii. 1-14. 
 St. John V. 40. 
 
Liberty 233 
 
 her wings, and ye would not^ ^ There is not 
 one statement that anything else but mercy 
 and grace has been eternally prepared by God 
 for any human soul. In that awful parable of 
 judgment which discloses the convincing picture 
 of the final separation of the evil from the 
 good, Christ says distinctl}^ that the jo}^ of 
 the blessed has been prepared for them from 
 the foundation of the world, but of the punish- 
 ment of the cursed. He says with equal dis- 
 tinctness that it was not prepared for them, 
 but for the devil and his angels. ^ No one is 
 ever lost because he cannot do good, but only 
 because he will not do what he can. 
 
 As for the doctrine of heredity, while Christ '^'^^^'«^ ^'^ 
 
 "-- . ■ . . . heredity. 
 
 recognizes the truth that it contains, it seems 
 as if He purposely set Himself to expose, and 
 to ridicule with a Divine scorn, the falsehood of - 
 its fatal extremes. He said to those who were 
 relying upon heredity to save them : " Think 
 not to say within yourselves, We have Abra- 
 ham to our father; for I say unto you that 
 God is able of these stones to raise up chil- 
 dren unto Abraham." 3 He said to His dis- 
 ciples when they foolishly, taking up the cant 
 of the day about inherited sin and inevitable 
 
 1 St. Matt, xxiii. 37. 2 gt. Matt. xxv. 34-41. 
 3 St, Matt. iii. 9. 
 
The weak- 
 ness of man. 
 
 234 Liberty 
 
 punishment, asked whether the blind man or 
 •^y his parents had sinned that he was born blind, 
 "Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents, 
 but that the works of God should be made 
 manifest in him." ^ The true inheritance, the 
 deepest inheritance which Jesus recognizes in 
 the human race, is an inheritance from God ; 
 a nature made in the Divine image, spiritual, 
 free, responsible, and capable, though so sadly 
 marred, though so far astray, of returning to 
 communion with the Heavenly Father. ^ 
 
 Undoubtedly Christ perceived and taught ^ 
 the immense difficulty^^being good; th e in- 
 firmi ty which long centuries of sin has wrought 
 into the very fibres of the soul; the awful 
 and almost inaccessible height of true holi- 
 ness; the enormous obstacles which lie in the 
 way of attaining it. The gate is strait, and 
 we must agonize to enter in by it. The 
 road is steep, and we must toil to climb it. 
 " How hardly shall they that have riches enter 
 into the kingdom of God."^ And yet "the 
 kingdom of heaven suffered violence, and men 
 of violence take it by force. "^ There is an 
 effort Avhich succeeds even in this greatest 
 of all endeavours, not in its own strength, 
 
 1 St. John ix. 3. 3 gt. Mark x. 23. 
 
 2 See Appendix, note 54. * St. Matt. xi. 12. 
 
Liberty 235 
 
 but because it is sure of a Divine assistance. The grace 
 "With man it is impossible, but not with 
 God."^ To the human will, enfeebled and 
 corrupted, so that it is like a sick man, barely 
 able to turn himself upon his couch, and look 
 and long and cry for help, threegreat sources 
 of strength are always open and accessible. 
 
 The fi rst is pray er. " Men ought always to I'rayer. 
 pray, and not to faint." ^ How sweet and 
 serene is the voice that rings through the vain 
 disputations and doubtful wranglings of the 
 scribes and Pharisees, and calls every sinful 
 soul to pray ! Pray ! you may not be able to 
 realize your own ideal, but you can ask God 
 to help you hold fast to it and struggle towards 
 it. Pray ! 
 
 " More things are wrought by prayer 
 Than this world dreams of." ^ 
 
 Pray ! For God is not deaf, nor sleeping, nor 
 gone upon a journey ; He has not bound you 
 to an inexorable fate and bound Himself not to 
 interfere with it. Pray ! The liberty of your 
 own soul, and the liberty of God Himself, dwells 
 in that word ; for when you stretch your feeble 
 hand to Him, a Divine hand will meet it, and 
 
 1 St. Mark x. 27. 2 st. Luke xviii. 1. 
 
 * 3 Tennysou, The Passing of Arthur. 
 
236 Liberty 
 
 break your fetters, and lift you out of darkness 
 
 and death into life and light. 
 
 The Holy The second source of strength is the Ho ly 
 
 ^"^ * Spirit. It is inconceivable, morally impossible, 
 
 that there should be such a Spirit, and yet that 
 
 His influence should be withheld from those 
 
 who need and implore it. ''If ye then, being 
 
 evil, know how to give good gifts unto your 
 
 children, how much more shall your heavenly 
 
 Father give the Holy Spirit unto them that 
 
 ask Him."i 
 
 Christ our The third source of strenorth is Christ Him- 
 
 Helper. . — * 
 
 self. Does the sense of past guilt stand in the 
 way of future effort ? He says, " I have power 
 on earth to forgive sins." ^ Does the soul feel 
 dead and hopeless under the burden of evil 
 habits ? He says, " I came that they may have 
 life, and may have it abundantly."^ Do the 
 works of a true and vital righteousness seem 
 far beyond our power? He says, ''Without Me 
 ye can do nothing ; " * but, " Lo, I am with you 
 alway, even unto the end of the world." ^ " He 
 that believeth on ]\Ie, the works that I do shall 
 he do also, and greater works than these shall he 
 do, because I go unto the Father."^ The whole 
 
 1 St. Luke xi. 13. * st. John xv. 5. 
 
 2 St. Mark ii. 10. & St. Matt, xxviii. 20. 
 
 3 St. John X. 10. c St. John xiv. 12. 
 
deliverance. 
 
 Liberty 237 
 
 life of Christ is summed up in the words, " But 
 as many as received Him, to them gave He foioer 
 to become the sons of God." ^ 
 
 But this receiving, we need to remember and Ti^^ way of 
 assert again and again, is not a passive thing. 
 It is an action of the soul, the opening of a door 
 within the heart, the welcoming of a heavenly 
 master. God does not save men as a watch- 
 maker who repairs and sets a watch, but as a 
 King who recalls his servants to their duty, as 
 a Father who makes new revelations of His love 
 to draw His lost children back to Himself. The 
 dogmas of the schools in regard to the working 
 out of what they call the scheme of redemption 
 sound like the creak and rattle of some vast 
 machine. The doctrine of Christ is like the 
 soft breath of spring, evoking the songs of birds 
 and the unfolding of new life. No fiery chariot 
 of grace swoops doAvn to snatch men to glory. 
 But a living Messenger comes forth from God 
 to ask men to turn and walk back with Him to 
 their soul's home. The invitation itself is a 
 guarantee of the power to accept it. With au- 
 thority Christ commanded the Avinds and the sea 
 and they obeyed Him. But with gracious plead- 
 inof He invited the hearts of men, aud those that 
 were willing gladly heard and followed Him. 
 1 St. John i. 12. 
 
238 
 
 Liberty 
 
 God helps 
 those who 
 he!}} them- 
 
 Christus 
 Liberat07\ 
 
 
 
 "If any man loilh to come after Me," ^ — that is 
 the prelude of His message. He offers a leader- 
 ship to men who can follow, a mastership to 
 men Avho can obey. Out of this first movement 
 He promises to guide and direct the whole de- 
 velopment of the new life, — not a passive life 
 of retirement, of ascetic meditation, of reflec- 
 tion upon secret truth, — but an active life of 
 service, of warfare against evil in the world, a 
 life which translates truth into conduct. 
 
 Contrast the religion of Jesus in this respect 
 with the Oriental religions, and with those 
 forms of Christianity which have borrowed the 
 garments of Buddha and speak with the accent 
 of Mahomet. T hey despise and slight pe r- 
 sonality. Christ respects and emphasizes it. 
 They aim to reduce ami ^evaporate res^Don^i- 
 bility. Christ aims to deepen and increase 
 it. They point forward to a bl ank Nirv ana 
 in which the individual is lost and absorbed, 
 or a Paradise in which he is forever lapped in 
 sensual ease and pleasure. Christ speaks of 
 the perfecting of the individual through the 
 Divine communion and service on earth, and 
 his entrance in heaven upon a new stage of 
 the same communion, the same service, — 
 "not in a blessed idleness, but in an exalted 
 1 St. Matt. xvi. 24. 
 
Liberty 239 
 
 kingly work and activity." And the entrance 
 to this kingdom on earth, the continuance in 
 its reahn of liberty, the attainment of its final 
 glory, are all through an act of the will. The 
 freedom which originated in God is only to be 
 preserved by returning to God and abiding in 
 Him. 
 
 " Our wills are ours, we know not how ; 
 Our wills are ours, to make them Thine." ^ 
 
 That is the teaching of Jesus. That is the 
 truth which, when it comes to men, makes 
 them and keeps them free. 
 
 IV 
 
 It is impossible that we should be faithful The age 
 
 ')}€€cls thts 
 
 preachers of Christ to the present age, unless 
 
 X 
 
 message. 
 
 we preach this truth. There may have been 
 ages in which it was important to dwell upon 
 other sides and aspects of the manifold reality 
 of the spiritual world. But to-day this is the 
 important side ; this is the aspect which de- 
 mands a clear recognition and an unfaltering 
 proclamation by those who mean to be true to 
 Christ and loyal to the needs of humanity. I 
 do not believe that there is a single passage in 
 the Old Testament which contradicts Christ's 
 1 Tennyson, In 3Iemonam, Proem. 
 
240 Liberty 
 
 doctrine of the real liberty of the souL But 
 if there were such a passage, I would leave it 
 forever alone, as belonging to that knowledge 
 which was in part, and which was done away 
 when that which was perfect had come. I do 
 not believe that there is a single word in the 
 St. Paul on writings of St. Paul which stands against this 
 freedom. ^^^^^i^^^ of the real libejtj of the soul. I 
 cut loose from the false interpretations which 
 men have read into his words. I take the 
 light of Christ's teaching in my hand, and I 
 go back to interpret by that light the teach- 
 ings of the great Epistle to the Romans with 
 its glorious revelation of " the mystery which 
 hath been kept in silence through times eter- 
 nal, but now is manifested, and by the Scriptures 
 of the prophets, according to the commandment 
 of the eternal God, is made known unto all 
 the nations unto obedience of faith.'' '^ I hear 
 again the cry of the struggling, labouring, con- 
 quering apostle : " To ivill is present with me^ y^ 
 but to do that which is good is not. ... O 
 wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me 
 out of the body of this death? I thank God 
 through Christ Jesus our Lord;'''^ and I know 
 that St. Paul also was a believer in the free- 
 dom of the will, and that he received this 
 1 Rom. xvi. 26. 2 Rom. vii. 18, 24, 25. 
 
Liberty 241 
 
 gospel and the power to fulfil it, through the 
 proclamation of liberty in Jesus Christ. 
 
 "This matter of free-will," wrote one of the Free-ioUi 
 most orthodox of theologians, but a few years question"^'^ 
 before his death, "underlies everything. If 
 you bring it to question, it is infinitely more 
 •than Calvinism. ... I believe in Calvinism, 
 and I say. that free-wdll stands before Calvin- 
 ism. Everything is gone if free-will is gone ; 
 the moral system is gone, if free-will is gone ; 
 you cannot escape except by Materialism on 
 the one hand or by Pantheism on the other. 
 Hold hard therefore to the doctrine of free- 
 will." i 
 
 Yes, and we may say more than this. Not 
 only is the moral system gone, but the great 
 attraction of Christ is gone, the power of His 
 gospel to liberate men is gone, if free-will is 
 gone. 
 
 The age has hypnotized itself. It is drift- The age has 
 ing steadily towards fatalism. It denies free- ^^se^/". 
 dom, and therefore it is not free. It is in 
 bondage to its own doubt. It is enslaved by 
 its own denial. If there is such a thing as 
 liberty, it can only be developed, as everything 
 else has been develoj^ed, by action, by exercise. 
 
 1 A. A. Hodge, Popular Lectures on Theological Themes 
 (Philadelphia, 1887), p. 184. 
 
 R 
 
242 Liberty 
 
 Life is self-change to meet environment. Lib- 
 erty is self-exertion to unfold the soul. The 
 law of natural selection is that those who use 
 a faculty shall expand it, but those who use it 
 not shall lose it. Religion is life, and it must 
 grow under the laws of life. Faith is simply 
 the assertion of spiritual freedom ; it is the 
 first adventure of the soul. Make that ad- 
 venture towards God, make that adventure 
 towards Christ, and the soul will know that it 
 is alive. So it enters upon that upward course 
 which leads through the liberty of the sons of 
 God to the height of heaven, 
 
 " Where love is an unerring light 
 And joy its own security." ^ 
 
 We must This is the truth with which we are to go 
 
 libertij in ^^^* a-gospclling in this age of doubt. We are 
 Christ. to tell men that though much has been deter- 
 
 mined for them by causes beyond their control, 
 — their circumstances, their talents, their facul- 
 ties, — o ne thin g has not been determined, and 
 that i s what they will do with them . Much has 
 been ordained before their birth, — their nation- 
 ality, their family, their station in life, — but 
 • one thing has not been ordained, and that is 
 whether they are to move fr om this star ting- 
 1 Wordsworth, Ode to Duty. 
 
Liberty 243 
 
 point towards life or towards death. They 
 may be like men sunken in a nightmare dream 
 of helplessness, muttering in their sleep, " If I 
 am to be saved, I shall be saved ; if I am to be 
 lost, I shall be lost," — but we must cry to them 
 with the voice of the Spirit : " Awake, thou / 
 that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and 
 Christ shall give thee light." 
 
VII 
 
 SOVEREIGNTY 
 
" I say to thee, do tliou repeat 
 To the first man thou niayest meet 
 In lane, highway, or open street — 
 
 " That he and we and all men move 
 Under a canopy of love, 
 As broad as the blue sky above ; 
 
 " That doubt and trouble, fear and pain 
 And anguish, all are shadows vain. 
 That death itself shall not remain ; 
 
 " That weary deserts we may tread, 
 A dreary labyrinth may thread. 
 Through dark ways underground be led ; 
 
 " Yet if we will one Guide obey. 
 The dreariest path, the darkest way. 
 Shall issue out in heavenly day ; 
 
 "And we, on divers shores now cast, 
 Shall meet, our perilous voyage past, 
 All in our Father's house at last." 
 
 — Richard Chenevix Trench. 
 The Kingdom of God. 
 
VII 
 SOVEREIGNTY 
 
 The questions about the world which science ^^*^ ^^"'^- 
 
 1-1 du'^'ies of 
 
 considers and answers, all have to do with science, 
 secondary causes. Beyond that sphere she does 
 not need to go, and within that sphere her wis- 
 dom is sufficient. We come to her like curious 
 children. We "want to see the wheels go 
 round." We want to know Avhat the wheels 
 are made of. She tells us, and there she stops. 
 All that we have a right to ask of her is that 
 she shall be true to facts, and that she shall 
 confine herself to them. When the astronomer 
 Laplace was reproached for not mentioning God 
 in his treatise on the dynamics of the solar 
 system, he answered, " I had no need of that 
 hypothesis." And this reply was just, as Mr. 
 John Eiske has pointed out, because " in order 
 to give a specific explanation of any single 
 group of phenomena, it would not do to ap- 
 peal to divine action, which is equally tlie 
 source of all phenomena."^ 
 
 1 Christian Literature, January, 1896, "The Everlasting 
 Reality of Religion," p. 306. 
 
 247 
 
248 Sovereignty 
 
 The great But the moment we take tliis reasonable 
 
 TevojiT^ ^^ ^^^^ modest position (and it is a great pity 
 them. that theology has not been more ready to take 
 
 it), we perceive that curiosity in regard to 
 single groups of phenomena by no means satis- 
 fies or exhausts the activity of the questioning 
 spirit in man. There is a deeper curiosity in 
 regard to the relation of these single groups 
 of phenomena to each other, and to ourselves, 
 and to the possibility of a meaning, a purpose, 
 an end, underlying all things and all their 
 workings. Out of this deeper curiosity rise 
 the questions which are most urgent and vital, 
 — questions which, when we consider them ab- 
 stractly, are philosophical, and condition the 
 unity of our intellectual life ; but when we con- 
 sider them personally, they are religious, and 
 upon their answer our spiritual peace and moral 
 action absolutely depend. How are we to think 
 about the things that we know ? What are we 
 to believe in regard to the things that science 
 tells us we cannot know, but which we still 
 feel are necessary conditions of all intelligent 
 and right conduct ? Is there an invisible unity 
 beneath all the visible diversity of phenomena? 
 What is the nature of that unity, personal or 
 impersonal, conscious or unconscious? • Is there 
 anything behind the mechanical working of 
 
Sovereignty 249 
 
 the world, now so wonderfully explained, which 
 corresponds to what there is in us when we 
 make and use a machine or an instrument, 
 when we plant and cultivate a garden, or when 
 we select and train a noble race of animals? 
 Is there a final cause towards which things 
 work together, and a supreme power which 
 guides them to that end? 
 
 This is the question of sovereignty. We The ques- 
 can no more help asking it than we can help ^gQ^lreignty 
 thinking. 
 
 We are in the world like voyagers on a ship. 
 We inquire what the ship is made of; and 
 science tells us, — iron and wood. And what 
 makes it float ? The buoyancy of the air which 
 it contains. And what makes it go? Steam. 
 And what makes the steam ? The heat of the 
 furnace. Then, if we are sufficiently inter- 
 ested, science takes us down into the engine- 
 room, and shows us all the condensers and 
 pistons and cranks and wheels, more fully than 
 they have ever been shown before ; and we are 
 amazed and profoundly grateful. We come up 
 again into the light of day. We look into the 
 overarching heaven, the home of sunshine and 
 storm, the deep mother of light and darkness. 
 We look out upon the great and wide sea, 
 full of mystery and terror. New questionings 
 
250 
 
 Sovereignty 
 
 Has the 
 ivorld a 
 captain? 
 
 spring to our lips. Where is the ship going? 
 Is there a captain on board ? Does he know, 
 does he care, what is to become of it? Is he 
 wise, is he faithful, is he a good captain ? Can 
 he direct the vessel through tempests and dan- 
 gers? Can he tell us how to work with him, 
 how to act in times of peril and perplexity? 
 Can we be sure of him, can we trust him ? 
 
 Now to this questioning, scepticism gives a 
 reply of desperate uncertainty ; and positivism 
 answers with a stern and sullen. No ! The 
 world is a derelict vessel, and we are master- 
 less and lost mariners. This answer has been 
 expressed by a French poet in powerful and 
 pathetic verse. 
 
 " Jouet de I'ouragan, qui I'emporte et le mene, 
 Encombre de tresors et d'agres submerges, 
 Ce navire perdu, mais c'est le nef humaine, 
 Et nous sommes les uaufrages. 
 
 '* L'equipage affole manoeuvre en vain dans I'ombre ; 
 L'Epouvante est a bord, le Desespoir, le Deuil ; 
 Assise au gouvernail, la Fatalite sombre 
 Le dirige vers un ecueil."i 
 
 But Christ gives a very different answer. 
 It seems as if His very words were chosen to 
 contradict this view of life as a helpless, hope- 
 
 1 L. Ackerman, 3Ia Vie, Poesies, etc. (Paris, 1885), " Le 
 Cri," p. 180. 
 
answers 
 
 Sovereignty 251 
 
 less voyage, and humanity as a shipwrecked Christ 
 race. For what is it that He says to His jr 
 disciples as they look out upon the mystery of 
 existence ? 
 
 " Seek not what ye shall eat, and what ye 
 shall drink, neither he ye as a ship that is tossed 
 on the waves of a tempestuous sea (^jxr) jxereoopC- 
 fecr^e), for your Father knoweth that ye have 
 need of these things." ^ 
 
 The vessel is not driving masterless over the 
 ocean. The Captain is on board. He is God. 
 He is also our Father. For all who trust and 
 serve Him, it is a sure voyage, a certain port, 
 a safe harbour. 
 
 The doctrine of the presence and sovereignty ^^^e 
 of God in His world, in one form or another, is 
 essential to the validity of any reasoning which 
 attempts to go beyond the mere appearance of 
 things. Without it we find ourselves, as one 
 has well said, " put to permanent intellectual 
 confusion." Without it the world lies before 
 us, as Pope wrote in the first draft of his Essay 
 on Man^ — 
 
 " A mighty maze, and all without a plan." 
 
 1 St. Luke xii. 29. 
 
 sovereignty 
 of God. 
 
252 
 
 Sovereignty 
 
 Christ's 
 view of it. 
 
 And if we follow the poet in that cold pliilo- 
 sophical deism which led him to revise his fa- 
 mous line so that it now reads 
 
 '' A mighty maze, but not without a plan," i 
 we are still in the dark, still confused and 
 hopeless, unless we go further and learn enough 
 of Him who made the plan, to trust Him even 
 when we cannot perfectly understand His work- 
 ing, and to confide absolutely in "His most 
 holy, wise, and powerful preserving and govern- 
 ing all His creatures and all their actions." ^ 
 
 This is what Christ gives us : a view of God 
 in His world which requires faith to accept it, 
 but which when it is accepted, satisfies the rea- 
 son and the heart better than any other view, 
 clears away many of the intellectual and moral 
 difficulties which beset us, and becomes the in- 
 ward source not of doubt and distress, but of 
 certainty and peace. 
 
 This is not true, we must admit, of some of 
 the forms in which the doctrine of divine sov- 
 ereignty has been preached in Christ's name. 
 They have often disregarded the facts of nat- 
 ure. They have often outraged the moral 
 instincts of humanity. They have created 
 new obstacles to faith. They have driven men 
 
 1 Pope's Essay on Man, part i., line 6. 
 ^ The Shorter Catechism, question xi. 
 
Sovereignty 253 
 
 back in dumb resentment to believe in the 
 positivist's "sombre Fatality," rather than in 
 an absentee God who has foreordained, by one 
 and the same decree, all the evil and all the 
 good, ^11 the sorrow and shame and suffering 
 that are in the world. 
 
 Not so with Christ's teaching. It is sane 
 and sweet. It allays resentment and begets 
 serenity. It gives a reconciling, harmonizing, 
 atoning view of God's sovereignty. And if 
 we can see it clearly and preach it faithfully, 
 it will be to-day, as it was in His day, one of 
 the great attractions of the gospel for an age 
 of doubt. 
 
 II 
 
 Christ's doctrine of the divine sovereignty Chnst's 
 was both old and ncAV. It was old because it ^andmV 
 recognized the truth, uttered so magnificently 
 by prophets and psalmists, of God's right and 
 poAver to rule the universe which He has 
 made. "Thy throne, O God, is for ever and 
 ever."i "The Lord hath j^repared His throne 
 in the heavens and His kingdom ruleth over 
 all. "2 "He doeth according to His will in the 
 army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of 
 the earth : and none can • stay His hand, or say 
 unto Him, What doest Thou ? " ^ 
 1 Psalm xlv. 6. 2 Psalm ciii. 19. 3 Daniel iv. 35. 
 
world. 
 
 254 . Sovereignty 
 
 A simpler But Clirist's doctriiie was new because it 
 
 revelation. ^.q^^^^Iq^i ^]jq presence of the sovereign God in 
 the physical universe more simpl}^, more natu- 
 rally, more intimately, than it had ever been 
 revealed before. How gentle, how plain, how 
 mildly luminous, is the language in which 
 Jesus expresses this truth, compared with the 
 flashing, rolling speech of the prophets ! He 
 uses the words of common life, transfigured 
 with emotion, — the language of lyric, rather 
 than of epic, poetry. 
 God in His The manifestations of divine power in the 
 Old Testament appear chiefly as mighty works, 
 exceptional forthputtings of supernal force. 
 It seems sometimes as if they came from a 
 distance ; as if God had withdrawn from the 
 world and had been called back to it by the 
 peril and the cry of His people. But Christ 
 would teach us to feel that He has never gone 
 away for an instant. He is always here. 
 Nothing that happens is hidden from Him. 
 Nor does He hide Himself from any who 
 would behold Him. We may see Him every 
 day, in the feeding of the birds, in the blos- 
 soming of the flowers, 
 
 " And every wayside bush aflame with God." 
 In all the processes of nature He is present 
 and sovereign. 
 
Sovereignty 255 
 
 This view of the relation of God to the ma- The divine 
 
 , • ^ -IT- j_. 1 1 1-T immanence. 
 
 terial world is not external and mechanical. 
 It is inward and vital. God has not made the 
 world and wound it np and left it to rnn by 
 itself. He is in it, as really as a man is in the 
 house that he inhabits, and all the potencies 
 that move and animate it flow directly from 
 Him. The Jcavs thought that God had fabri- 
 cated the universe in six daj^s and sat down to 
 rest on the seventh, laying aside His work as 
 a clock-maker would put down a finished 
 clock. But Christ said, "My Father worketh 
 until now, and I work."^ Creation is not 
 ended, it is going on all the time. Yesterday 
 was a creative day ; and so is to-day ; and so 
 to-morrow will be. The divine thought is 
 still weaving its beautiful garment on the 
 roaring loom of Time. 
 
 But God's activity in the world is not ca- The divine 
 pricious or disorderly. No one was more sen- 
 sitive than Jesus to "the rhythmic element 
 in nature, — the flow of rivers, the procession 
 of stars, the antiphony of day and night, the 
 silent but inviolate order of the seasons." ^ It 
 was He who expressed the law of growth : 
 
 1 St. John V. 17. 
 
 2 H. W. Mabie, Essai/s on Nature and Culture (New York, 
 1896), p. 295. 
 
256 Sovereignty 
 
 "first the blade, then the ear, and after that 
 the full corn in the ear/'^ It was He who 
 suggested the analogy of natural law in the 
 spiritual world, applying the figure of germi- 
 nation to His own death and resurrection : 
 " Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground 
 and die, it abideth alone ; but if it die, it 
 bringeth forth much fruit. "^ The parables 
 which He used to describe the kingdom of 
 heaven were drawn from nature and based on 
 law. It was like "leaven which a woman 
 took and hid in three measures of meal until 
 the whole was leavened," or "like a grain of 
 mustard seed, which a man took and sowed 
 in his field ; which indeed is the least of all 
 seeds, but when it is grown it is the greatest 
 among herbs." ^ He taught His disciples to 
 look upon the regular and steadfast ordinances 
 of nature as the proof that their Heavenly 
 Father was mindful of them and would take 
 care of them. You will not find any such su- 
 perfluous phrase as " special Providence " in the 
 teaching of Jesus. His thought was of a gen- 
 eral and universal Providence, wide enough 
 and deep enough to embrace the wants of all 
 creatures and provide for them. God's chil- 
 
 1 St. Mark iv. 28. 2 gt. John xii. 24. 
 3 St. Matt. xiii. 32, 33. 
 
Sovereignty 257 
 
 dren were not to trust in miracles and marvels 
 for tlieir daily bread ; they were not to be 
 always looking and calling for the extraordi- 
 nary, — manna from the sky, water from the 
 riven rock. They were to rest rather upon 
 the course of nature in quiet confidence, and 
 work with it in cheerful joy, knowing that 
 He who clothes the grass of the field will much 
 more clothe them,^ — and by the same power 
 working in the same Avay. 
 
 Yet Jesus did not think of God as havins' Miracles not 
 
 o 
 
 exhausted all possible modes of His activity "^^^^^g 
 in those which are familiar to us.^ His pres- 
 ence in the world is of such a personal kind 
 that it necessarily brings w^ith it the power of 
 direct, personal, infinitely varied action. Out 
 of this power spring those strange signs and 
 wondrous works which we call miracles. Jesus 
 never said that they were against nature. He 
 never even said that they w^ere supernatural. 
 He claimed only that they were proofs of a 
 divine mission, because they were such Avorks 
 as could only come from God. They were 
 signs, just as all uncommon and extraordinar}^ Signs of 
 acts are signs. But signs of what? Of per- ^'^'**^'*" ^ ?^' 
 sonality, of that power of choice in modes of 
 
 1 St. Matt. vi. 30. 
 
 2 See Appendix, note 55. 
 
258 Sovereignty 
 
 action which is the essential attribute of a 
 free sj^irit. They were wrought in order 
 that men might believe, not in order that 
 they might be astonished; and just as truly 
 in order that they might believe in the order 
 of nature as in the Person who upholds it by 
 His presence. 
 The reign of "An energy," says Mr. Rusldn, "may be 
 law. natural without being normal, and divine 
 
 without being constant." Jesus did not teach 
 the reign of law. He taught the reign of God 
 throuHi law. And in order that men misfht 
 be sure that the laAV did not bind God like a 
 chain, but freely expressed His sovereign will, 
 it was given unto Jesus to show men those 
 rare Avorks, unique and transcendent, like 
 strokes of genius, which reveal, as if by flashes 
 of liglit, the true relation between the sover- 
 eign God and the universe which He is mak- 
 ing and ruling. 1 
 The secret It is always to tliis personal God that Jesus 
 
 would direct the thoughts and confident affec- 
 tions of men. How is it possible for any one to 
 miss His meaning, and translate it into some- 
 thing entirely different, as jNIatthcAv Arnold 
 does in his misinterpretation of what he calls 
 "the secret of Jesus" ? It is not merely the joy 
 1 See Appendix, note 56. 
 
Sovereignty 259 
 
 and peace of self-renunciation that Jesus sets 
 
 forth to His disciples. It is the inward qui- Trust in a 
 
 - T T . sovereign 
 
 etude and rest oi sen-surrender to a iovmg jPather. 
 Father who is also the Mighty God. And it 
 is not from the sense of His resistless power, 
 but from the consciousness of His love, of 
 His Fatherhood, that peace comes. " Yea, 
 Father, for so it w^as well-pleasing in Thy 
 sight." ^ ''Father, all things are possible unto 
 Thee ; remove this cup from Me : howbeit 
 not what I will, but what Thou wilt."^ 
 "Father, into Thy hands I commit My spirit. "^ 
 This is the secret of Jesus. He does not teach 
 bare sovereignty to which we must yield be- 
 cause it is irresistible. He teaches sover- 
 eignty of a certain kind, — the sovereignty 
 of a Father, who is as much better, as He is 
 more powerful, than all earthly parents or 
 rulers, and who will never forsake His world, 
 nor suffer His children to slip from His mighty 
 hand. 
 
 in 
 
 But sovereignty of this kind necessarily im- 
 plies distinctions in the manner of its exercise. 
 It cannot possibly be conceived of in terms of 
 
 1 St. Matt. xi. 26. 2 gt. Mark xiv. 36. ^ gt. Luke xxiii. 46, 
 
260 
 
 Sovereignty 
 
 The highest 
 kind of 
 sovereignty 
 discrimi- 
 nates. 
 
 A lower 
 kind of 
 sovereignty 
 mechanical. 
 
 any single force or confined to any one mode of 
 operation. It must be flexible and discriminat- 
 ing. It must include within itself as many 
 forms of rule as there are forms of being under 
 its dominion. What, for example, should we 
 say of a king who had but one way of dealing 
 with all his subjects, young and old, wise and 
 ignorant, loyal and disloyal, and who treated 
 his servants under precisely the same condi- 
 tions as his horses and his chariots ? Or what 
 should we say of a father who attempted to reg- 
 ulate and rule his children without reference to 
 their character, and who made no distinction 
 between them and the furniture of his house ? 
 Yet this, in effect, is the theory of the divine 
 sovereignty Avhicli has frequently been set forth 
 by theologians as if it were the only one which 
 did justice to the glory of God. 
 
 " The will of God," according to this theory, 
 "is the irresistible force. It is the source of 
 all things, all persons, all events. From it they 
 all proceed, under it they all act, by an invari- 
 able necessity. This will has already deter- 
 mined from all eternity everything that comes 
 to pass. Every character in the world, like 
 every rock and every plant, is just what God 
 willed it to be. Everything that happens, hap- 
 pens because He willed it and precisely as He 
 
Sovereignty 261 
 
 willed it. The life of mankind is far from 
 being in any sense a voyage, an adventnre, a 
 probation. It is simply the process of printing 
 a history which has already been written and 
 set in type down to the last letter. The great 
 press is in motion. Our souls are the blank 
 pages. On one is printed a foreordained prayer. 
 On another a foreordained blasphemy. Death 
 is the folding knife. Judgment is the act of 
 binding, in which the fair pages will be pre- 
 served and the foul pages rejected and burned. 
 The sovereignty of God is exercised in seeing 
 that the book goes through the press exactly as 
 it was written, without the addition or sub- 
 traction of a single syllable of the foreordained 
 text." 
 
 But surely, even if this theory were true and The lower 
 could be proved, it is not of a nature to give f^iQ^ioi^g^ 
 aid and comfort to those who are zealous for 
 the glory of God. It does not really exalt and 
 magnify the divine sovereignty, but narrows 
 and degrades it. It does not call for the per- 
 fect wisdom and unlimited resources of a potent 
 Ruler able to meet emergencies, to overcome 
 oppositions, to guide and direct intelligent and 
 free subjects like Himself, and to conduct a 
 high enterprise, through all the difficulties that 
 may arise, to a successful end. It calls for 
 
262 Sovereignty 
 
 qualities of a lower kind and a strictly limited 
 scope ; the exact knowledge and the applied 
 strength of a skilful machinist ; not the broad 
 intelligence, the swift genius, the inexhaustible 
 patience, and the triumphant personal influ- 
 ence of a great Captain, a Master and Lord of 
 men. 
 Which kind It is conceivable, of course, that God mieht 
 
 has God ^ 
 
 chosen? nnYQ chosen to create a universe in which His 
 
 sovereignty should be exercised in this one un- 
 varying line of foreordained necessity. Being 
 supreme. He has both the right and the power 
 to make such a sphere, or spheres, for the rev- 
 elation of His attributes as may please Him. 
 But it is not humanly conceivable that He 
 should have made this particular choice which 
 is ascribed to Him for His own glory. If He 
 had chosen this kind of a universe, so far as we 
 can see, it must have lowered and hidden His 
 glory. It must have left Him with a held in 
 which the highest qualities of personality could 
 not possibly be exercised. It must have made 
 all subsequent choice, and all approval or 
 disapproval, and all truly moral government 
 impossible. The existence of rewards and pun- 
 ishments, the sense of merit or demerit among 
 the creatures of such a world, would be inex- 
 plicable. Nay more, it would be a cruel delu- 
 
Sovereignty 263 
 
 sion, wliicli, since it must come like everything 
 else, according to this theory, from the Avill of 
 the Maker, would reflect a dark shadow of dis- 
 credit upon His moral character. To claim 
 that tins sense of responsibility, like all other 
 parts of the system, may be a necessity, a legal 
 fiction which is essential to the working" of a 
 scheme far above our comprehension and there- 
 fore above our judgment, makes it more awful, 
 but not more admirable. If there is any valid- 
 ity whatever in our moral instincts, we need not 
 hesitate to sa}^, that from our present point of 
 view, which is for us the only one attainable, 
 this theory of the absolute and unconditional 
 sovereignty of God, exercised by one law of 
 necessity over all creatures, is so far from being 
 for God's glory that it is apparently for His 
 shame and dishonour. 
 
 As a matter of fact, it has been, and still is, Tkedifi- 
 
 . . cultles of 
 
 the most fertile mother of doubts. "A uni- absolutism. 
 verse in which all the power was on the side of 
 the creator, and all the morality on the side of 
 creatiou, would be one compared with which 
 the universe of naturalism would shine out as a 
 paradise indeed." ^ The idea of an irresponsible 
 God ruling by an eternal and inflexible fiat 
 over responsible men, is a moral nightmare, 
 1 Foundations of Belief p. 320. 
 
Jesus de- 
 livers us 
 from them. 
 
 264 Sovereignty 
 
 under which humanity groans, and from which 
 it struggles to awake, even though it shoukl 
 have to open its eyes upon the blank darkness 
 of an unsearchable night. Between the un- 
 knowable God of agnosticism and the unlov- 
 able God of absolutism, there is indeed little 
 to choose. But the choice, such as it is, lies 
 on the side of agnosticism. It is unspeak- 
 ably better to doubt God's personalitj^. His 
 sujDremac}^, His very being, than it is to 
 doubt His eternal goodness and His moral 
 integrity. 
 
 But the teaching of Jesus is designed and 
 fitted to deliver us, if we will accept it, from 
 both of these doubts. He reveals a God who 
 is not only Lord of all, but who exercises His 
 sovereignty in discretion, in justice, and in 
 love. He does not look upon all His creatures 
 with the same eyes. He discriminates, He 
 distinguishes, He has regard to their differ- 
 ences of nature and character. The human 
 soul is of more value to Him than many spar- 
 rows.^ How much is a man better than a 
 sheep ? 2 By so much as he is more like God, 
 spiritual, free, responsible, immortal. These 
 qualities, which God Himself has created, God 
 Himself respects. Everj^ word of Jesus takes it 
 1 St. Matt. X. 31. 2 St. Matt. xii. 12. 
 
Sovereignty 265 
 
 for granted that God is not an infinite Auto- God is a 
 crat, a hard master, reaping where He has not ^'''''''''''^''^ 
 sown, and gathering where He has not strewed, 
 but a fair and equitable Lord, who takes into 
 consideration all the conditions of His subjects 
 and renders unto all their dues. The forces of 
 nature obey His will inevitabl}^ and for them 
 there is neither praise nor blame. The souls 
 of men are invited to love Him, and com- 
 manded to serve Him, but they are left free to 
 choose whether they will obey or disobey, and 
 upon their choice the approval and blessing of 
 God depend. 
 
 Who can question for a moment that this is The divine 
 the view of the divine sovereignty which un- Z^/S^m 
 derlies all the parables of Christ ? The omnip- in action. 
 otence which He teaches is not sheer, absolute, 
 unconditioned. It is a self -restrained power. 
 It is able to limit itself, to act in such a way 
 and under such conditions as God chooses to 
 create. If He could not do this, He would not 
 be truly omnipotent. If there were but one 
 method in wdiich He could manifest His will, 
 and that the method of necessity. He would be 
 forever shut out from j^ersonal relations, wliich 
 can only exist where there are different wills, 
 capable of agreement or disagreement, of co- 
 operation or conflict, of harmony or discord. 
 
266 Sovereignty 
 
 Jesus believed and taught that God has actu- 
 ally chosen to limit the autocratic exercises of 
 His sovereignty by creating beings who have 
 the power of yielding to His will or of resist- 
 ing it.i 
 
 And from this resistance flow all the evil, 
 all the sorrow, all the misery of the world. 
 God does not ordain sin. God does not even 
 permit sin, in the sense that He allows it to 
 exist without opposition and condemnation on 
 His part. It may be a necessary feature of 
 a world of free choice and moral probation. 
 Jesus seems to imply as much when He says 
 "It must needs be that offences come." But 
 He adds at once, " Woe unto that man by whom 
 the offence cometh."^ That man is not doing 
 the will of God. He is a rebel, a traitor, an 
 apostate. Sin is a perversion of the heart from 
 its true purpose just as blindness is a perver- 
 sion of tlie eye from its true function, ^ When 
 the tares appear in the field, Christ does not 
 leave us to suppose for a moment that they 
 were planted by the same hand that sowed the 
 good seed. He says, " An enemy hath done 
 this."^ Satan, who is the embodiment of evil 
 and the leader of all who are opposed to God, 
 
 1 See Appendix, note 57. ^ gt. Lnke xi. 34-36. 
 
 2 St. Matt, xviii. 7. ^ gt. Matt. xiii. 28. 
 
Sovereignty 267 
 
 is the great enemy, the adversary not only of 
 souls, but also of the Divine will. 
 
 Turn for a moment to the narrative of the ^i'^' is the 
 temptation of Christ. ^ He was led up by the ^nlmy. ^^ 
 Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of 
 the devil. But did the same Spirit lead the 
 devil? Was Satan acting under the divine 
 sovereignty in the same sense, in the same way, 
 that Jesus was ? Set aside, if 3^ou will, the 
 question of the personality of the evil one. 
 There Avas a suggestion of evil before the mind 
 of Jesus. Did that suggestion come from the 
 same source as the holy strength that resisted it, 
 — the all-creating, all-controlling w411 of God ? 
 Can the same fountain send forth sweet and 
 bitter waters? Why then should the one be 
 called cursed and the other blessed? Such a 
 view simply obliterates all moral distinctions. 
 It completely undermines and ruins the sig- 
 nificance of Christ's life as a free obedience to 
 the will of God, and it utterl}^ paralyzes His 
 gospel as a divine call to men to enter freely 
 into the same obedience. 
 
 Jesus teaches very distinctly that there are Tioo spheres 
 two spheres in which the sovereignty of God sovereignty. 
 is exercised, — in heaven and on earth. ^ These 
 
 1 St. Matt. iv. 1-11. 
 
 2 Beysclilag, New Testament Theology, vol. i., pp. 84, 85. 
 
268 
 
 Sovereignty 
 
 Militant 
 on earth. 
 
 two spheres are not conceived locally but spirit- 
 ually. They are realms in which the power of 
 God is working under different conditions. In 
 
 Triumphant {^Qr^y^^^ ^\^q Divine -will is unopposed, and there- 
 in heaven. ^^ ' 
 
 fore the empire of heaven is peace and holiness 
 
 and unbroken love. On earth the Divine will 
 is opposed and resisted, and therefore earth is 
 a scene of conflict and sin and discord. For 
 this reason the kingdom of heaven must come 
 to earth, it must win its way, it must strive 
 with the kingdom of darkness and overcome it. 
 God's sovereignty in heaven is triumphant. 
 God's sovereignty on earth is militant, in order 
 that it may triumph, — and triumph not in uni- 
 versal destruction, but in the salvation of all 
 who will submit to it and embrace it and work 
 with it, — triumph not by bare force, as gravi- 
 tation triumphs over stones, but by holy love, 
 as fatherly wisdom and affection triumph over 
 the reluctance and rebellion of wayward chil- 
 dren. 
 
 It must be admitted frankly that this view 
 of Divine sovereignty does not seem to be 
 consistent with the theory of absolute divine 
 foreknowledge of all volitions and all events. ^ 
 This has been urged as a fatal objection against 
 it. But the objection cannot be pressed because 
 1 See Appendix, note 58. ' 
 
Sovereignty 269 
 
 it lies in a region where our ignorance is so 
 great that dogmatism is, to say the least, unbe- 
 coming. There may be some way of reconcil- 
 ing the self-limitation of God's omnipotence 
 with the certainty of His foreknowledge, which 
 is beyond the reach of our logic. But whether 
 there be any such reconciliation or not, one 
 thing is clear : we have not the right to make 
 a logical statement of our ignorance of one 
 divine attribute a reason for refusing to accept, 
 frankly and sincerely, Christ's revelation of 
 the mode in which another divine attribute is 
 exercised. 
 
 God knows everything. But when we say Foreknoiv- 
 that, we mean simply that He knows every- ^^^^^^^/^^^^^^^^^ 
 thing Avhich can be the object of knowledge, the facts. 
 He knows all things as they are. He does not 
 know them as they are not. The very perfec- 
 tion of His knowledge consists in its exact 
 correspondence with the nature of its object. 
 If an event is certain, fixed, and foreordained, 
 then God knows it as certain, fixed, and fore- 
 ordained. If it is contingent upon the free, self- 
 determining, preferential action of a human will, 
 then God knows that it is contingent, for He 
 Himself has foreordained that it should be so. 
 
 God waits to hear whether His children will ^^'^'^ ^<'«''''- 
 call upon Him in their distress; and if they 
 
270 
 
 Sovereignty 
 
 Theproha- 
 tion of men. 
 
 The Lord 
 of Hosts. 
 
 call, He hears and helps them. If Jesus teaches 
 anything, He teaches that prayer really in- 
 fluences the purpose and action of God.^ 
 
 God waits to see whether His husbandmen 
 will return to Him the fruits of His vineyard ; 
 whether they will receive and honour the mes- 
 sengers whom He sends unto them ; and if they 
 are rejected. He sends other messengers ; and 
 last of all He sends His Son, saying, "It may be 
 they will reverence him." 2 But when this last 
 maybe does not come to pass, then judgment 
 falls upon the wicked husbandmen, not because 
 they have fulfilled the secret Avill of the King, 
 but because they have rebelled against Him. 
 
 This conception of God in His world, not as 
 the mere spectator of the fulfilment of His 
 own immutable decrees, but as tlie Lord of 
 Hosts, presiding over the great scene of con- 
 flict between good and evil in the souls of 
 men Avho can only attain to real holiness 
 through real liberty, and warring mightily on 
 the side of good in order that it may win the 
 victory, infinitely exalts and glorifies Him. 
 We see Him in the teaching of Jesus, as the 
 High Captain of the armies of love, working 
 salvation in the midst of the earth, pleading 
 with men to accept His mercy, warning them 
 1 See Appendix, note 59. 2 gt, l^xke xx, 13. 
 
liberty. 
 
 Sovereignty 271 
 
 to escape from His judgments, sustaining the 
 good in their goodness, overthrowing the 
 wicked in their wickedness, bringing light 
 out of darkness and triumph out of defeat, 
 amid all strifes and storms maintaining His 
 kingdom of righteousness and peace and joy 
 in the Holy Ghost. His sovereignty embraces Sovereignty 
 
 T Ti j_ j_i 1 -11 emb7'aces 
 
 human liberty as the ocean surrounds an island. 
 His sovereignty upholds human liberty as the 
 air upholds a flying bird. His sovereignty 
 defends human liberty as the authority of a 
 true king defends the liberty of his subjects, 
 
 — nay, rather, as the authority of a father 
 tenderly and patiently respects and protects 
 the spiritual freedom of his children in order 
 that they may learn to love and obey him 
 gladly and of their own accord. For this is 
 the end of God's sovereignty : that His king- 
 dom may come ; that His will may be done 
 on earth, — not as it is done in the circling 
 of the stars or in the blossoming of flowers, 
 
 — but as it is done in heaven, where created 
 spirits freely strike the notes that blend in 
 perfect harmony with tlie music of the Divine 
 Spirit, where 
 
 " Thousands at his bidding speed 
 And post o'er land and ocean without rest; 
 They also serve who only stand and wait." 
 
272 
 
 Sovereignty 
 
 IV 
 
 Boes thit, 
 create un- 
 certainty 9 
 
 The reserve 
 of power. 
 
 Evil tran- 
 sient, good 
 eternal. 
 
 But does not the acknowledgment that God 
 has thus limited the operation of His sover- 
 eignty on earth by conditioning His actions 
 upon the character and conduct of other beings 
 than Himself, throw us back into confusion and 
 uncertainty? Does it not make the course of 
 the world insecure and the end of all things 
 doubtful ? 
 
 It would do so if it Avere not for the other 
 truth which Jesus reveals with equal clearness, 
 that God is in the world guiding, ruling, and 
 directing it, and that He has kept the suprem- 
 acy in His own hands. His presence is the 
 talisman of creation. He is the master of the 
 ship ; His hand is on the helm ; and whether 
 the sailors obey or mutiny. He will guide the 
 vessel to her appointed haven. 
 
 The 2^ower of evil is a finite, transient, self- 
 destroying power. It disintegrates, it dies, it 
 passes away with the enfeeblement and de- 
 struction of the soul that yields to it. But 
 the power of goodness is eternal and incor- 
 ruptible, because it is of God. Satan is the 
 prince of this world, but his might is limited 
 to the perverted and enslaved wills that sub- 
 mit to him. He is not the ruler of nature. 
 
rock of our 
 trust. 
 
 Sovereignty 273 
 
 God is the master of winds and waves and 
 earth and stars. The great battalions are on 
 His side and under His control. If for one 
 instant the cause of Christ were in real dan- 
 ger, He could summon celestial hosts without 
 number to His assistance. ^ Bat because He 
 knew this, He knew also that His cause was 
 never in danger. He knew that His kingdom 
 was an everlasting kingdom. He knew that 
 He had already overcome the world. 
 
 How serene and splendid are the words with (^loa the 
 which He reassures His disciples, again and 
 again! ^^ Fear not! Care not! Be 7iot anx- 
 ious ! thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou 
 doubt? Have faith in Qod ! Upon this rock 
 will I build my church and the gates of hell shall 
 7iot prevail against it! Fear not, little flock, for 
 it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the 
 ki^igdom!'' How glorious is the vision of that 
 kingdom which Jesus unfolds as He looks for- 
 ward to the new birth of earth and heaven in 
 the perfect fulfilment of the pui-pose of God ! 
 How absolute is the confidence with which He 
 rests upon God's power to work out all that 
 may be needed to bring about that blessed 
 consummation. The unwavering faith of Jesus 
 in the permanence and w^orld-wide diffusion and 
 1 St. Matt. xxvi. 53. 
 
274 
 
 Sovereignty 
 
 The inspv^a- 
 tion of 
 heroism. 
 
 The secret 
 of courage. 
 
 ultimate triumph of His kingdom of truth and 
 holiness and love, is not the least — some- 
 times I think it is the greatest — evidence 
 of His divinity and charm of His gospel. 
 
 Communicated by His divine influence to the 
 hearts of His disciples, this faith has been a 
 force of incalculable potency and inspiration in 
 the lives of men. The noblest deeds of liero- 
 ism and self-sacrifice and liberation have been 
 wrought in the strength of it. The greatest 
 conquests over self and sin, the supreme vic- 
 tories of righteousness and love and peace in 
 human hearts, have been won through this faith. 
 Deus vult — God wills it ! — is the war-cry that 
 rouses the human will to its highest endeavour. 
 
 Here is a man struggling against evil, long- 
 ing and striving to rise to high and holy life. 
 And if he is alone in the struggle, what assur- 
 ance has he, what promise or hope of success ? 
 He may fail, he may perish. But when tlie 
 p'reat truth flashes into his heart that God is 
 with him in the fight, that God is "not will- 
 ing that any should perish but that all should 
 come to repentance,"^ that God is the captain 
 of his salvation and the leader of his soul, 
 — then he is emancipated, then he triumphs, 
 then he is joined to the Invincible. He cries 
 1 2 Pet. iii. 9. 
 
Sovereignty 275 
 
 Avith Paul, "If God is for us, who is against 
 us ? " 1 
 
 Here is a saint called to endure sharp and The 
 heavy trials, to drink the bitter waters of 
 affliction, to pass through the hres of pain, to 
 go down into the dark valley of the shadow. 
 Alone, it would be impossible ; human patience 
 could not endure it, human courage could not 
 face it, human Avisdom could not solve the mys- 
 ter}^ of goodness called to suffer. But with 
 God, believing that He is sovereign, and that 
 He is love, — how different it is ! Now you 
 shall see the wondrous spectacle of a frail, gen- 
 tle, mortal soul, strengthened by simple sub- 
 mission to God's will, persecuted but not for- 
 saken, cast down but not destroyed, trembling 
 but victorious. Such a soul cries : " The will 
 of God be done. It cannot be His will that I 
 should lose my faith. It cannot be His will 
 that I should deny Him. It cannot be His 
 will that I should be lost, for He is good. He is 
 my King, my Father, He will save me. It 
 may be His will that I should suffer trial for 
 the purifying of my faith, for a more perfect 
 fellowship with Christ, for a better reward in 
 heaven. Even so. Father, for so it seemeth 
 good in Thy sight. 
 
 1 Rom. viii. 31. 
 
 strength of 
 endurance. 
 
God in 
 history. 
 
 276 Sovereignty 
 
 " I welcome all Thy sovereign will, 
 For all that will is love ; 
 And when I know not what Thou dost, 
 I wait the light above." 
 
 How radiant and magnificent is that truth 
 as it appears in the history of the Church. The 
 people of God have often been persecuted and 
 oppressed, yet God has been on their side, and 
 no weapon that has been formed against them 
 has prospered. Here is Philip of Spain send- 
 ing his great Armada to crush the Reformed 
 Church of England and destroy religious lib- 
 erty in the cradle. Like a huge flock of vul- 
 tures with outspread wings and fierce talons 
 and harsh innumerable cries of menace, that 
 most terrific company of war-ships that ever 
 darkened air and sea swoops towards its prey. 
 But the wrath of God meets it on the ocean, 
 and drives disorder through its serried ranks ; 
 the swift little ships of England pierce it, and 
 break its wings, and riddle it with terror ; its 
 onset is changed to flight, and as it flies, the angry 
 blasts of heaven and the wild waves of wrath 
 catch it again, and whirl it away, and scatter 
 on a hundred rocky shores and lonely beaches 
 the wrecks and fragments of the lost Armada. 
 How often has that wondrous history been 
 repeated ! How often has God proved His 
 
Sovereignty 277 
 
 sovereignty by preserving and rescuing and 
 delivering His people from overwhelming 
 perils ! Even when it has seemed to be other- 
 wise, even when the Church has appeared for- 
 saken and helpless, when the billows of perse- 
 cution have rolled fathom-deep above her head, 
 when avalanches of falsehood have buried the 
 truth out of sight, it has only been for a time, 
 and the end has been the victory of the de- 
 feated. The blood of the martyrs has been 
 the seed of the Church. The boastful shouts of Truth ami 
 error have been the advertisement of the silent 
 truth. Error has had kings and generals, 
 philosophers and orators, empires and armies ; 
 truth has had God. Error has had swords and 
 spears, ships and cannons, fortresses and dun- 
 geons, racks and fires ; truth has had God. 
 God and one make a majority. Unless the 
 Church doubts, she cannot fear. Unless the 
 Church denies, she cannot despair. In the dark- 
 est days, when the confusion seems greatest, 
 the conflict most unequal, she can look out on 
 the great battle-field and cry 
 
 '' History's pages but record 
 One death-grapple in the darkness 'twixt old systems and 
 
 the Word ; 
 Truth forever on the scaffold, Wrong forever on the 
 
 tlirone, — 
 
278 
 
 Sovereignty 
 
 The victory 
 is sure. 
 
 The final 
 consumma- 
 tion. 
 
 Yet that scaffold sways the future, and behind the dim 
 
 unknown 
 Standeth God within the shadow, keeping watch above 
 
 His own." 1 
 
 But is it for the Church alone, is it not for 
 the whole world that this truth of God's sov' 
 ereignty shines ? To our eyes the conflict of 
 life and death, of good and evil, seems to be 
 undecided, and we think it may be perpetual. 
 The dust blinds us ; the uproar bewilders us ; 
 as far as our sight can pierce we see nothing 
 but the rolling strife, — sin always in arms 
 against holiness, the created will always resist- 
 ing and defying the creator. But Christ sees that 
 the conflict is decided, though it is still in prog- 
 ress. Christ sees that the victory is won, 
 though it is not yet manifest. On the hill of 
 the cross the captain of salvation met the cap- 
 tain of sin and conquered him. Calvary is 
 victory. Through death Christ hath overcome 
 him that had the power of death, that is the 
 devil. ^ Satan has received his mortal wound ; 
 and if he still fights more fiercely, it is because 
 he knoweth that he hath but a short time.^ The 
 day is coming when he must perish ; the day is 
 coming when sin and strife shall be no more ; 
 
 1 James Eussell Lowell, The Present Crisis. 
 
 2 Heb. ii. 14. 3 i>ev. xii. 12. 
 
Sovereignti/ 279 
 
 the day is coming when Christ shall put all 
 enemies under His feet^ and shout above the 
 grave of death, ' ' O thou enemy, destructions 
 are come to a perpetual end " ; the day is com- 
 ing when the great ship of the world, guided 
 by the hand of the Son of God, shall float out 
 of the clouds and storms, out of the shadows 
 and conflicts, into the perfect light of love, and 
 God shall be all in all. The tide that bears the 
 world to that glorious end is the sovereignty 
 of God. 
 
 O mighty river, strong, eternal Will, 
 In which the streams of human good and ill 
 Are onward swept, conflicting, to the sea, — 
 The world is safe because it floats in Thee. 
 
 1 1 Cor. XV. 25-28. 
 
VIII 
 
 SERVICE 
 
" Thyself and thy belongings 
 Are not thine own so proper as to waste 
 Thyself upon thy virtues, they on thee. 
 Heaven doth with us as we with torches do, 
 'Not light them for themselves ; for if our virtues 
 Did not go forth of us, 't were all alike 
 As if we had them not. Spirits are not finely touched 
 But to fine issues ; nor Nature never lends 
 The smallest scruple of her excellence, 
 But, like a thrifty goddess, she determines 
 Herself the glory of a creditor — 
 Both thanks and use." 
 
 — Measure for Measure. 
 
VIII 
 
 SERVICE 
 
 That strange and searching genins, Nathaniel This uneven 
 Hawthorne, in one of his spiritual phantasies 
 has imagined a new Adam and Eve coming to 
 the earth after a Day of Doom has swept aw^ay 
 the whole of mankind, leaving their w^orks and 
 abodes and inventions, — all that bears witness 
 to the present condition of humanity, — un- 
 touched and silently eloquent. The represent- 
 atives of a new race enter with wonder and 
 dismay the forsaken heritage of the old. They 
 pass through the streets of a depopulated city. 
 The sharp contrast between the splendour of 
 one habitation and the squalor of another, fills 
 them with distressed astonishment. They are 
 painfully amazed at the unmistakable signs of 
 inequality in the conditions of men. They are 
 troubled and overwhelmed by the evidence of 
 the great and miserable fact that one portion 
 of earth's lost inhabitants was rich and com- 
 fortable and full of ease, while the multitude 
 283 
 
284 Service 
 
 was poor and weary and heavy-laden with 
 toil.i 
 The sense of This feeling of sorrowfnl perplexity over the 
 
 distress at V j. • • j_- p i 
 
 life's ine- unevenness and apparent mjustice oi human 
 quality. life, which the prose poet puts into the heart 
 of his new Adam and Eve, is really but a reflec- 
 tion from the tender and pitiful depths of his 
 own. Who is there that has not sometimes 
 felt it rising within his own breast, — tliis pro- 
 found sentiment of inward trouble and grief, 
 this feeling of spiritual discord and wondering 
 repugnance at the sight of a world in which the 
 good things of life are so unequally distributed, 
 in which at the very outset of existence, before 
 the factor of personal merit or demerit, the 
 element of work and wages, enters into the 
 problem at all, so much is given to one man 
 and so little to another man that they seem to 
 be forever separated and set at enmity with 
 each other by the unfairness with which they 
 are treated? 
 The sympa- This Sentiment has been strangely deepened 
 and intensified in the nineteenth century by 
 innumerable causes, until it has become one of 
 the most marked characteristics of the present 
 age. Never before have men felt the sorrows 
 
 1 Hawthorne's Works, Riverside Edition, 1884 ; Mosses 
 from an Old 3Ianse, p. 297. 
 
 thy of the 
 age 
 
Service 285 
 
 and hardships of their fellow-men so widely, so 
 keenly, so constantly as to-day. In one sense 
 this is the honour and glory of our age. It is 
 an evidence of quickened moral sensibility, a 
 revival or renewal of the noblest capacities of 
 our human nature. 
 
 But in another sense it is the greatest peril A noble 
 of our age. For it has been seized by the spirit %^-^^"^^fQ 
 of scepticism and transformed into an ally of madness. 
 annihilating doubt. It has been used as an 
 argument against the possibility of discovering 
 a moral order in such a "hungry, ill-condi- 
 tioned world" as this. Man's inhumanity to 
 man has been employed to prove God's indiffer- 
 ence or injustice to man. The feeling of sor- 
 row and perplexity has been aggravated by 
 wild and whirling words into a passion of 
 resentment against the present conditions of 
 life. Rash and sweeping schemes for their 
 total destruction have been proclaimed as a new 
 gospel. Christianity has been first claimed as 
 a supporter of these schemes, and then de- 
 nounced and repudiated as the chief obstacle 
 to their success. The cry goes up that the 
 whole world is out of joint. " Everything is 
 wrong and crooked and unfair : the race of 
 man has been deceived and maltreated and 
 oppressed by the creation of such an order of 
 
286 Service 
 
 life as the present. If God created it, so much 
 the worse for God. But it is ahnost certain 
 that He did not create it, almost certain that 
 there is no God. The world of inequality is 
 man's mistake. There is hut one thing to do, 
 and that is to break it all up, at once and 
 utterly, and begin anew. Create a new world 
 if possible. If not, then let the old wreck sink 
 and be blotted out, for it is worse, infinitely 
 worse, than the blank desolation of an uncon- 
 scious chaos." 
 What shall This cry of anger and despair rings to- 
 day in the ears of all earnest and thoughtful 
 men and women. The element of sincerity, 
 of truth, of justice, that thrills unmistakably 
 through its strange, fierce music, stirs our 
 hearts to the core. We are filled with per- 
 turbation and distress and deep anxiety to 
 know the right and to do it, to understand the 
 meaning of this exceeding great and bitter cry, 
 and the duty to which it calls us. Is it mdeed 
 the utterance of true equity and wisdom ? Is 
 it the voice of a new Adam, appearing after so 
 many ages of delusion, with open eyes to con- 
 demn the old world, and with ruthless hand to 
 break it in pieces ? Must we welcome him and 
 hearken to him and believe in him, as the true 
 judge and regenerator and leader of mankind ? 
 
Service 287 
 
 The very form of the question points the Christ's 
 
 way to the only Master who can answer it. «"«^««';«'"^ 
 •^ '^ example. 
 
 Hawthorne's picture of the second Adam was 
 a poetic dream. But the Apostle Paul uses the 
 same figure to reveal a historic truth. "The 
 first man Adam became a living soul. The last 
 Adam became a life-giving spirit. Howbeit 
 that is not first which is spiritual, but that 
 which is natural ; then that which is spiritual. 
 The first man is of the earth, earthy ; the 
 second man is of heaven." ^ The new Adam 
 has already come upon the earth, eighteen cen- 
 turies ago. He was called Jesus. With pure 
 and perfect heart He entered into the world, 
 not desolate and depopulate, but thronged Avith 
 the myriads of toiling, suffering men. With 
 clear eyes He looked upon their different con- 
 ditions, their manifold inequalities, their out- 
 ward and inward joys and sorrows. With 
 steadfast heart He set Himself to the divine 
 task of beginning a new humanity and inaugu- 
 rating the kingdom of heaven on earth. 
 
 He did not strive nor cry, neither was His His caim- 
 voice heard in the streets. ^ He did not protest '^^^^ "'" 
 
 -•- sanity. 
 
 against the moral government of the universe, 
 
 because one man was rich and another poor, 
 
 one strong and another weak, one happy and 
 
 1 1 Cor. XV. 45-47. 2 gt. Matt. xii. 19. 
 
288 Service 
 
 another wretched, one good and another evil. 
 He did not say that God must be unjust be- 
 cause He has given, in things spiritual as well 
 as in things temporal, much to one and little 
 to another. He did not teach His followers 
 that the only way to help the world was to 
 rebel against this order, and refuse to submit 
 to it, and denounce it, and fight against it. 
 He did not even proclaim a social and political 
 revolution. He was the most peaceful, orderly, 
 obedient, loyal citizen of all that subject land of 
 Palestine ; rendering unto Ciesar the things 
 that were Ciesar's, discharging every duty of 
 His lowly lot with cheerful fidelity, and labour- 
 ing patiently for His daily bread. 
 He knoivs He was not blind, nor dull of heart to feel 
 
 the troubles of life. The problem of inequality 
 lay wide open before Him. But it did not 
 agitate nor distract Him. He neither raved 
 nor despaired. He was serene and sane. 
 
 " He saw life clearly and He saw it whole." 
 
 He looked through the problem to its true 
 solution. He knew the secret which justifies 
 the ways of God to man. He knew the secret 
 by which an eternal harmony is to be brought 
 into the apparent discords of life. He knew 
 the secret by which men living in an unequal 
 
 the secret. 
 
Service 289 
 
 world, and accepting its inequality as the con- 
 dition of their present existence, can still be- 
 come partakers of a perfect, peaceful equity, 
 and citizens of an invisible, imperishable city 
 of God. That secret was none other than the 
 highest, holiest doctrine of Jesus, the divine 
 truth of election to service. 
 
 Before we set our hearts to take in the Christ's 
 meaning and the fulness of this truth, let us d^^P^^M 
 
 . PI ^^^^ present 
 
 try to get them m tune for it by listening to loorid. 
 some of the other teachings of Jesus which are 
 meant to quiet and steady us in the contempla- 
 tion of the unevenness of human existence. 
 
 And first of all He reminds us that our real 
 happiness in this world does not depend upon 
 our outward condition, but upon our inward 
 state. " The life is more than meat and the 
 body than raiment."^ "A man's life consist- 
 eth not in the abundance of the things which 
 he possesseth."2 'pj^g land of wealth is not the 
 empire of peace. Joy is not bounded on the 
 north by poverty, on the east by obscurity, on 
 the west by simplicity, and on the south by 
 servitude. It runs far over these borders on 
 
 1 St. Matt. vi. 25. - St. Luke xii. 15. 
 u 
 
290 Service 
 
 every side. The lowliest, plainest, narrowest 
 life may be the SAveetest. Most of the disciples 
 of Jesus were peasants, but they were as happy, 
 as contented, even in this world, as if they had 
 been princes. There was more gladness and 
 singleness of heart in that frugal breakfast of 
 broiled fish and bread beside the boats on the 
 shore of the sea of Tiberias,^ tlian in the 
 splendid feast in the house of Simon the Phari- 
 see. Life has its compensations and its com- 
 forts for all estates. Work means health. 
 Obscurity means freedom. The best pleasures 
 are those that are most widely diffused. 
 The secret of I do not mean to say that Jesus overlooked 
 the bitter hardships of toil under bad masters, 
 under false and cruel and oppressive laws. I 
 do not mean to say that He would not have 
 been full of pity and indignation at the sight 
 of the crushed and crippled state of great mul- 
 titudes of human beings in our modern cities. 
 But I am sure that He teaches us to believe 
 that the real source of human misery is not in 
 poverty, but in a bad heart; that envy is not a 
 virtue, but a vice ; that life is a great gift to all 
 who will receive it cheerfully and contentedly, 
 even in a world wliere its material things are 
 unevenly distributed ; and that the true beati- 
 1 St. John xxi. 1-13. 
 
 happiness. 
 
Service 291 
 
 tudes are not monopolies reserved for the few, 
 but blessings within the reach of all, and glori- 
 ously independent of all outward contrasts in the 
 lives of men. Indeed it seems as if He Avould 
 go even beyond this, and remind us that some 
 of these blessings could not be ours except in a 
 world of contrast and temporal inequality. Of 
 the eight beatitudes which Jesus Himself pro- 
 nounced, four at least, — the blessing of the 
 mourners, and of the meek, and of the mer- 
 ciful, and of the peace-makers, — imply the 
 existence of differences and degrees among 
 men ; and one — the blessing of those who are 
 persecuted for righteousness' sake — is only 
 possible in a world where evil is sometimes 
 actually more powerful and prosperous than 
 good. 
 
 I have not been able to find a single word of The compen- 
 
 Christ that looks forward to a time in Avhich ^f'*^^^*^-/ 
 
 li/e. 
 
 there shall be no more inequalities on earth, no 
 more rich and poor, no more masters and ser 
 vants, no more wise men, and no more babeSo 
 But there are many words of His that pierce 
 with mild and gracious light through all these 
 outward distinctions to reveal the truth that 
 this kind of inequality is superficial and illusory, 
 that the babes rejoice in beholding those mys- 
 teries Avhich are hidden from the wise and pru- 
 
292 Service 
 
 dent, that servants are often nobler and more 
 free than their masters, that the poor may 
 have treasures laid up in heaven which are 
 beyond all earthly reckoning, and that this is 
 the true wealth which brings contentment and 
 peace. 
 Peace on It is a great mistake to suppose that Jesus 
 
 preached a gospel which was melancholy and 
 depressing for those who received it in this 
 world. It is a great mistake to suppose that 
 He taught men that they must resign them- 
 selves to earthly misery and make the journey 
 of life as a weary and mournful pilgrimage. 
 He came to cheer and brighten the hearts of 
 all who would accept His guidance and tread 
 the path of virtue with courage and fidelity and 
 hope. He came to give us rest in the midst of 
 toil, and that refreshment which only comes 
 from weariness in a good cause. He came to 
 tell us not to despair of happiness, but to re- 
 member that the only way to reach it on earth 
 is to seek first usefulness, first the kingdom of 
 God, and then the other things shall be added. 
 He that loseth his life for Christ's sake shall 
 not lose it but find \i} — find it in deep inward 
 contentment, 
 
 " And vital feelings of delight," 
 1 St. Matt. X. 39. 
 
Service 293 
 
 which make up the true and incomparable joy 
 of living. 
 
 Jesus does not differ from other masters in The secret 
 that He teaches us to scorn earthly felicity. ^ ^ ^^^ ^* 
 The divine difference is that He teaches us how 
 to attain earthly felicity, under all circum- 
 stances, in prosperity and in adversity, in sick- 
 ness and in health, in solitude and in society, 
 by taking His yoke upon us, and doing the 
 will of God, and so finding rest unto our souls. 
 That is the debt which every child of God owes 
 not only to God, but also to his own soul, — 
 to find the real joy of living. 
 
 "Joy is a duty," — so with golden lore Joy is a 
 
 The Hebrew rabbis taught in days of yore. duty. 
 
 And happy human hearts heard in their speech 
 Almost the highest wisdom man can reach. 
 
 But one bright peak still rises far above, 
 
 And there the Master stands whose name is Love, 
 
 Saying to those whom heavy tasks employ 
 
 " Life is divine when duty is a joy." 
 
 The second point in the teaching of Jesus The icorid 
 which is meant to rectify our views of the un- ^.^^^g^ 
 evenness of the world, is His doctrine of a future 
 life, — not a different life, but the same life mov- 
 ing on under new conditions and to new issues. 
 This world is not all. There is another world, a 
 better age, a more perfect state of being, in which 
 
294 Service 
 
 the sorrows and losses of those who now suffer 
 unjustly will be compensated, and in which — 
 let us not hesitate to say it as calmly and as 
 firmly as Jesus said it — those who have un- 
 justly and selfishly enjoyed their good things 
 in this world will suffer in their turn. It is 
 the fashion nowadays to sneer at such teaching 
 as this ; to call it " other-worldliness " ; to 
 declare that it has no real power to strengthen 
 or uplift the hearts of men. Jesus did not 
 think so. Jesus made much of it. Jesus 
 pressed home upon the hearts of men the con- 
 solations and warnings of immortality. He 
 showed the miserable failure of the man who 
 filled his barns and lost his empty soul.^ He 
 bade His disciples, when they suffered and Avere 
 persecuted for righteousness' sake, " rejoice and 
 be exceeding glad, for great is your reward 
 in heaven." ^ 
 
 Let us not impoverish our gospel by flinging 
 away, in our fancied superiority, this precious 
 balance of truth. It is impossible to justify the present 
 fragmentary existence of man if we look at it 
 and speak of it as the whole of his life. Earth 
 has mysteries which naught but heaven can 
 explain. Earth has sorrows which naught but 
 heaven can heal. Yes, and earth has evils, 
 1 St. Luke xii. 16-21. 2 st. Matt. v. 12. 
 
 The errors 
 of time call 
 for the 
 
Service 295 
 
 black and secret offences of man against man, 
 false and foul treasons against the love of God, 
 crimes which take a base advantage of His pa- 
 tience and long-suffering and hide themselves 
 like poisonous serpents in the shelter of the 
 very laws which He has made for the good of 
 the world, sins all entangled with the present 
 structure of society and beyond the reach of 
 human law, undiscoverable iniquities, unpardon- 
 able and unpunishable cruelties, — which naught 
 but hell can disclose and consume. The errors 
 of time call for the balance of eternity. Pa- 
 tient labour, patient endurance, patient resig- 
 nation in this present life shall be greatly 
 rewarded in the life to come. Now is the day 
 of toil and trial ; but the pay-day will surely 
 dawn. Much of the best that is done in this 
 world receives no earthly wages. Those to 
 whom it is done, — the poor, the maimed, the 
 lame, the blind, — '' they cannot recompense 
 thee ; but thou shalt be recompensed at the 
 resurrection of the just."^ 
 
 Thus Jesus teaches ; and He shoAvs us that This wi- 
 the present order of inequality, so far from ^^r^^^/;^^. 
 being an obstacle to this result, is the very Hon for the 
 means by which it is to be accomplished. The 
 discipline of this uneven life is the education 
 1 St. Luke xiv. 14. 
 
296 
 
 Service 
 
 Fraternltij 
 better than 
 equality. 
 
 by wliicli alone we can be prepared for the 
 heavenly life. Jesus does not present Himself 
 as a rectifier of life's unequal conditions of 
 outward fortune. He distinctly refuses this 
 office. " Man, who made me a judge or a 
 divider over you?"^ Jesus does not preach an 
 equality which is synonymous with life on a 
 dead level. He does not preach equality at 
 all. He preaches fraternity. And frater- 
 nity implies differences, — older and younger, 
 stronger and weaker, higher and lower. The 
 elder brother is the heir ; all that the father 
 has is his ; but his sin lies in holding fast 
 to his inheritance selfishly, in shutting out 
 his younger brother, in forgetting and deny- 
 Yfig that he is a brother at all.^ The distinc- 
 tions of life are not meant to obscure, but to 
 reveal and to beautify its best virtues. Out of 
 dependence spring the sweet blossoms of grati- 
 tude and loyalty. Out of mastership flow the 
 refreshing streams of forbearance and justice 
 and mercy. The apostle tells us that the love 
 of money is a root of all kinds of evil.^ 
 But Christ shows us the deeper truth that 
 the right use of money is a means of all 
 kinds of good. " It is more blessed to give 
 
 1 St. Luke xii. 14. 2 gt. Luke xv. 25-32. 
 2 1 Tim. vi. 10. 
 
Service 297 
 
 than to receive."^ Every gift of Providence 
 to us is an opportunity and therefore a re- 
 sponsibility, and the blessing does not come 
 with the gift until we recognize the responsi- 
 bility, and use the opportunity. The mammon 
 of unrighteousness can only be destroyed by 
 a process of transformation which transmutes 
 it into the pure gold of the celestial treasury.^ 
 The name of that process is charity. And the 
 translation of that name is wise and holy 
 love.^ 
 
 Let us try to think distinctly. It is said Christianity 
 
 1 ,1 , /^i • , • • , • and Com- 
 
 nowadays that Christianity means communism, 
 and that it is the duty of all Christians to 
 give away everything that they possess. It 
 is strange that Christ never proclaimed this 
 duty except to one man, and that man was not 
 a Christian.^ Of course it must be admitted 
 at once that this would be the duty of all 
 Christians if it could be showifi that it would 
 be for the real Qfood of their fellow-men. But 
 this never has been shown. On the contrary, 
 communism has always turned out badly. It 
 was tried in Jerusalem, in a limited way, when 
 the early Christians sold all that they had and 
 made a common purse ; but it led, in less 
 
 1 Acts XX. 35. 3 See Appendix, note GO. 
 
 2 St. Luke xvi. 19. * St. JNIark x. 21. 
 
298 Service 
 
 than ten years, to confusion and strife, and 
 sank the Jerusalem church into a condition 
 of pauperism and dependence upon the other 
 churches, which had avoided the well-meant 
 but dangerous experiment. It was tried in 
 France, under atheistic auspices, and its fruit 
 was wide-spread misery and injustice. It was 
 tried to some degree in England, under a sys- 
 tem of poor laws which were based upon the 
 idea that every man had a right to eat whether 
 he would work or not, and it resulted in such 
 disorder and demoralization that it had to be 
 discarded as a menace to society. 
 Love thy There is nothing in the teachings of Christ 
 
 which would make us blind to these plain 
 lessons of history. On the contrary. He de- 
 sires and commands us to discover and do that 
 which will really bless and help our fellow- 
 men. '' Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy- 
 self," ^ — the same kind of love, the same in- 
 ward regard for the higher ends and aims of 
 life, which is the savinof g'race of the indi- 
 vidual soul, is to be the saving grace of so- 
 ciety. ^ And what kind of love is that ? It 
 is a wise and holy love, a love which puts 
 character first and comfort second, a love which 
 seeks to purify and bless and uplift the whole 
 1 St. Matt. xxii. 89. 2 gee Appendix, note CI. 
 
 neighhour 
 as loisely 
 and well as 
 tliyself. 
 
Service 299 
 
 man. Such a love may be shown by withhokl- 
 ing as truly as by bestowing. False charity 
 pampers self and pauperizes others. True char- 
 ity educates self by helping others. The so- 
 called Christian who never gives is a false 
 Christian. The Christian who gives carelessly, 
 blindly, indiscriminately, however generously, 
 is a very imperfect Christian. The Christian 
 who gives thoughtfully, seriously, fraternally, 
 bending his best powers to the accomplishment 
 of a real benefaction of his fellow-men, bestow- 
 ing himself with his gift, is in the true and 
 only way of the following of Jesus. 
 
 Preach this truth. Preach it home to the Every pHvi- 
 hearts of men, without fear or favour for rich tUl^l^f^T 
 or poor. Preach it home to your own heart 
 so close that it shall save you from the min- 
 ister's besetting sins of spiritual selfishness and 
 cant. Tell the Lady Bountiful that she is not 
 called to discard her ladyhood, but to give her- 
 self with all her refinements, with all her ac- 
 complishments, with all that has been given to 
 her of sweetness and light, to the ennobling 
 service of lunnanity. Tell the Merchant-Prince 
 that he is not called to abandon his place of 
 influence and power, but to fill it in a princely 
 spirit, to be a true friend and father to all who 
 are dependent upon him, to make his prosper- 
 
300 Se^'vice 
 
 ity a fountain of blessing to his fellow-men, to 
 be a faithful steward of Almighty God. And 
 then let us tell ourselves, as members of the 
 so-called " educated classes," to whom God has 
 given even greater gifts than those of rank and 
 riches, — privileges of knowledge, opportunities 
 of culture, free access to the stored-up wisdom 
 of the ages, — let us tell ourselves with un- 
 flinching fidelity that God will hold us to a 
 strict account for all these things. If our salt 
 loses its savour it shall be trodden under foot 
 of men. If our culture separates us from hu- 
 manity we shall be cast into the outer darkness. 
 Our light must shine or be shamefully extin- 
 guished. Every faculty and every gift we 
 possess must be honestly and entirely conse- 
 crated to the service of man, in Christ's name 
 and for Christ's sake.^ This is the gospel for 
 the present age, and for every age. This is 
 Social re- the way in which the kingdom of heaven is to 
 be established on earth. This is the way in 
 which the inequality of this mortal life is to 
 be transfigured and irradiated with a divine 
 equity. " What we look for, work for, pray 
 for, as believers, is a nation where class shall 
 be bound to class by the fullest participation 
 in the treasure of the one life ; where the mem- 
 1 See Appendix, note 62. 
 
 generation. 
 
Service 301 
 
 bers of each group of workers sliall find in their 
 work the development of their character and 
 the consecration of their powers : Avhere the 
 highest ambition of men shall be to be leaders 
 of their own class, so using their special powers 
 without waste and following the common tradi- 
 tions to noble issues : where each citizen shall 
 know, and be strengthened by the knowledge, 
 that he labours not for himself only, nor for 
 his family, nor for his country, but for GOD."i 
 
 II 
 
 Thus far the teaching of Christ leads us with inequality 
 
 T -J.' ii_T _cj_iTi« in the spirit- 
 
 clear serenity m our understanding of the dif- ^^^^ world. 
 
 ferences among men in the distribution of the 
 
 goods of this present world. But the deeper 
 
 problem still remains untouched. There is an 
 
 apparent inequality in the bestowal of spiritual 
 
 blessings. In the life of the soul also, it seems 
 
 that much is given to one and little to another. 
 
 Some men are born very close to the kingdom 
 
 of heaven and powerfully drawn by unseen 
 
 hands to enter its happy precincts. Other men 
 
 are born far away from the gates of light, and 
 
 it looks to us as if all the influences of their life 
 
 were hindrances rather than helps to holiness. 
 
 1 B. F. Westcott, Bishop of Durham, The Incarnation 
 and Common Life (London, Macmillau, 1893), p. 82. 
 
302 
 
 Service 
 
 The doctrine 
 of election. 
 
 The search- 
 iny question. 
 
 False 
 unsioers. 
 
 There is an undeniable contrast in the religious 
 world which can only be interpreted as a divine 
 foreordination, — that is to say, an act by which 
 some men are set before others, given the pre- 
 cedence, offered an earlier and apparently an 
 easier opportunity of spiritual life. If God is 
 sovereign, this act, by which the means of grace 
 are unevenly dispensed, must be the result of a 
 divine choice. 
 
 The formal recognition of this choice is the 
 doctrine of election. It is an inevitable doc- 
 trine. It is founded u})on facts which admit 
 of no denial. And it brings every thouglitful 
 and earnest soul face to face with the question 
 of (piestions, upoji the answer to which the 
 nature and reality of religion depend. 
 
 Is God arbitrary, is God partial, is God unjust? 
 Does He bless some of His children and leave 
 the rest under an irremediable curse without a 
 single reason which can be exhibited to human 
 faith and justihed in perfect love ? In the last 
 and highest realm of life, the realm of the spirit, 
 does He make it more blessed to receive than 
 to give, and exercise His sovereignty in favour- 
 itism, and establish heaven as a kingdom of 
 infinite and eternal and inexplicable inequality? 
 
 It is an idle tiling to answer this question by 
 an appeal to God's absolute right to dispose of 
 
Service 303 
 
 all His creatures as He will. For the very Anarhi- 
 esseiice of true religion is the faith that He is '"'^ 
 such a God that He wills to dispose of all His 
 creatures wisely and fairly and in perfect love. 
 And the very essence of a true revelation, as 
 the message which calls religion into being, is 
 that it makes God's wisdom and fairness and 
 love manifest, and so helps us to understand 
 and adore and trust Him, not only for ourselves 
 but for the whole world. 
 
 It is an idle thiup" to answer this question by Anirrespon- 
 
 ^ -, • 1 IT- / sibleGod. 
 
 say nig that God is under no obligation to be 
 good to everybody, and therefore that He may 
 be good to whomsoever He pleases. The idea 
 of an irresponsible God is a moral mockery. 
 Poisonous doubt exhales from it as malaria from 
 a swamp. To teach that all men are God's 
 debtors, and that therefore it is right for Him 
 to remit the debt of one man, and to exact the 
 penalty from another to the last farthing, is to 
 teach what is logically true and morally false. 
 Our hearts recoil from such a doctrine. If 
 God has made us, and made us spiritual 
 paupers, utterly incapable of anything good, 
 we are not His debtors. Jesus teaches us that 
 God asks of us only to give as freely as we have 
 received. 1 He demands only that which He 
 1 St. Matt. X. 8. 
 
304 
 
 Service 
 
 A God 
 lohose glory 
 is not 
 goodness. 
 
 Election 
 perverted in 
 human 
 
 theology. 
 
 Himself has made us able to pay. And He 
 forgives like the good master in the parable, 
 with a free pardon which needs but the con- 
 fession of helplessness and poverty to call it 
 forth.i 
 
 It is an idle thing to answer this question by 
 an appeal to ignorance, and to say that God 
 elects some men to be saved and leaves the rest 
 of mankind to be lost simply for His own un- 
 searchable and inexplicable glory ! For God's 
 glory, as revealed by religion, is identical with 
 His goodness. Faith, true and joyful and up- 
 lifting faith, answers only to a gospel which 
 makes that identity more clear and luminous, 
 and shows that the divine election in the realm 
 of grace is perfectly consistent with that wide 
 and deep love wherewith God so loved the 
 whole world that He sent His only begotten 
 Son that whosoever belie veth in Him should 
 not perish but have everlasting life.^ 
 
 Now it is because men have forgotten this 
 that they have found no answer, or a false and 
 misleading answer, to the problem of inequality 
 in the spiritual world. It is because they have 
 torn the doctrine of election from its roots in 
 the divine love, and petrified it with unholy 
 logic, that it has lost its beauty, its perfume, 
 1 St. Matt, xviii. 27. ^ gee Appendix, note 63. 
 
Service 305 
 
 its power of fruitfulness to everlasting life. 
 
 We must go back from the dead skeleton as it 
 
 is preserved in the museum of theology to the 
 
 living plant as it blossoms in the field of the 
 
 Bible. We must go back of Jonathan Edwards, 
 
 and back of John Calvin, and back of Augustine, 
 
 to St. Paul, and see how, under his hand, all 
 
 the mysterious facts of election as they are 
 
 unfolded in human history, break into flower 
 
 at last in the splendid faith that "God hath 
 
 shut up all unto disobedience that He might 
 
 have mercy upon all." ^ We must go still 
 
 farther back, to Christ, and learn from Him 
 
 that election is simply the Avay in which God 
 
 uses His chosen ones to bless the world, — 
 
 the divine process by which the good seed is 
 
 sown and scattered far and wide and the 
 
 heavenly harvest multiplied a thousand-fold. 
 
 " I elected you," He says to His disciples and 
 
 to us, " I elected you, and appointed you, that 
 
 ye should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit 
 
 should abide. "2 
 
 Christ's doctrine of election is a living, ChrisVs doc- 
 trine of 
 fragrant, fruitful doctrine. It is the most 
 
 beautiful thing in Christianity. It is the very 
 
 core and substance of the gospel, translated 
 
 1 Romans xi. 82 ; see Appendix, note 64. 
 2 St. John XV. 16. 
 
 election to 
 service. 
 
306 
 
 S 67' vice 
 
 Christ as 
 the elect 
 servant. 
 
 The disciple 
 7nust be as 
 his Lord. 
 
 from the heart of God into the life of man. It 
 is the divine haw of service in spiritual things. 
 It is the supreme truth in the revelation of an 
 all-glorious love ; the truth that God chooses 
 men not to be saved alone, but to be saved by 
 saving others, and that the greatest in the king- 
 dom of heaven is he who is most truly the 
 servant of all.^ 
 
 Is not this true of Christ Himself? He is 
 the great example of what it means to be elect. 
 He is the beloved Son in whom the Father 
 is well pleased. And He says " Behold, I am 
 in the midst of you as he that serveth."^ Ser- 
 vice was the joy and crown of His life. Service 
 was the refreshment and the strength of His 
 soul, the angel's food, the "meat to eat" of 
 which His disciples did not know.^ 
 
 Was not this the lesson that He was always 
 teaching them by practice and by precept, that 
 they must be like Him if they would belong 
 to Him, that they must share His service if 
 they would share His election ! " I have ap- 
 peared unto thee for this purpose," He said 
 to Saul, " to make thee a servant {vTnjpeTrjv, a 
 roiver in the ship)^ and a witness both of those 
 things which thou hast seen and of the things 
 
 1 See Appendix, note 
 
 St. Luke xxii. 27. 
 
 3 St. John iv. 32. 
 
Service 307 
 
 in the which I will appear unto thee.''^ The 
 vision of Christ is the call to service. And if 
 Paul had not been obedient to the heavenly 
 vision could Saul have made his calling and 
 election sure ? But he answered it with a noble 
 faith. " It pleased God to reveal His son in 
 me in order that I might preach him among 
 the nations.'''^ Henceforward, wherever he 
 might be, among his friends in Cilicia, in the 
 dungeon at Philippi, on the doomed vessel 
 drifting across the storm-tossed Adriatic, in 
 the loneliness of his Roman prison, this was 
 the one object of his life, to be a faithful ser- 
 vant of Christ, and therefore, as Christ was, a 
 faithful servant of mankind. ^ 
 
 How can we interpret Christ's parables, with- Parables oj 
 
 out this truth? The parables of the Pounds ^J^J'^^^- 
 
 ^ ana service. 
 
 and the Talents are both pictures of election 
 to service. They both exhibit the sovereignty 
 of God in distributing His gifts ; they both 
 turn upon the idea of man's accountability for 
 receiving and using them ; and they both declare 
 that the reward will be proportioned to fidel- 
 ity in serving. The nature and meaning of 
 this is explained by Christ in His great descrip- 
 tion of the judgment, which immediately fol- 
 lows the parable of the Talents in St. INIatthew's 
 1 Acts xxvi. 16. 2 Gal. i. 16. s 2 Cor. iv. 5. 
 
key-note of 
 the king 
 dom. 
 
 308 Service 
 
 Gospel.^ Many of those who have known Him 
 will be rejected at last because they have not 
 served their fellow-men. Many of those who 
 have not known Him w^ill be accepted because 
 they have ministered lovingly, though igno- 
 rantly, to the wants and sorrows of the world. 
 Service, the Service is the key-note of the heavenly king- 
 dom, and he who will not strike that note shall 
 have no part in the music. The King in the 
 parable of the Wedding Feast ^ chose and called 
 his servants, not to sit down at ease in the 
 palace, but to go out into the highways and 
 bid every one that they met, to come to the 
 marriage. And if one of those servants had 
 refused or betrayed his mission, if he had neg- 
 lected his Master's business, and sat down on 
 the steps of the palace or walked pleasantly in 
 the garden until the supper was ready, do you 
 suppose that he would have found a place or a 
 welcome at the feast? His soul would have 
 stood naked and ashamed without the wedding- 
 garment of love. For this is the nature of 
 God's kingdom, that a selfish religion abso- 
 lutely unfits a man from entering or enjoying 
 it. Its gate is so strangely strait that a man 
 cannot pass through it if he desires and tries 
 
 1 St. Matt. XXV. 31-46. 
 
 2 St. Matt. xxii. 1-13. 
 
Service 309 
 
 to come alone ; but if he will bring others with 
 him, it is wide enough and to spare. 
 
 Who seeks for heaven alone to save his soul, 
 May keep the path, but will not reach the goal ; 
 While he who walks in love may wander far, 
 Yet God will bring him where the blessed are. 
 
 How wonderfully all this comes out in the The prayer 
 great intercessory prayer of Christ at the last ^^^^ ^^^^^' 
 supper.^ That prayer is the last and highest 
 utterance of the love wherewith Christ, having 
 loved His own which were in the world, loved 
 them unto the end. He prays for His chosen 
 ones : " I pray for them : I pray not for the 
 world but for those whom Thou hast given Me." 
 " Holy Father, keep them in Thy name -which 
 Thou hast given Me, that they may be one even 
 as We are. For their sakes I consecrate Myself, 
 that they themselves also may be consecrated 
 in truth. Neither for these only do I pray, but 
 for them also that believe on Me through their 
 word ; that they may all be one, even as Thou, 
 Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that they also 
 may be in Us ; that the world may believe that 
 Thou didst send Me." How the prayer rises, 
 like some celestial music, through all the inter- 
 woven notes of different fellowships, the fellow- 
 ship of the Father with the Son, the fellowship 
 
 1 St. John xvii. 
 
Christ's 
 ideal. 
 
 310 Service 
 
 of the Master with the disciples, the fellowship 
 of the disciples with each other, until at last it 
 strikes the grand chord of universal love. Not 
 for the world Christ prays, but for the disciples 
 in the world, in order that they may pray for 
 the world, and serve the world, and draw the 
 world to faith in Him. And so, in truth, while 
 He prays thus for His disciples. He does pray 
 for the whole world. Circle beyond circle, orb 
 beyond orb, like waves upon water, like light 
 from the sun, the prayer, the faith, the conse- 
 crating power spread from that upper room 
 until they embrace all mankind in the sweep of 
 the divine intercession. The special, personal, 
 elective love of Christ for His own is not 
 exclusive ; it is magnificently and illimitably 
 inclusive. He loved His disciples into loving 
 their fellow-men. He lifted them into union 
 with God ; but He did not lift them out of 
 union with the world ; and every tie that 
 bound them to humanity, every friendship, 
 every fellowship, every link of human inter- 
 course, was to be a channel for the grace of 
 God that bringeth salvation, that it might 
 appear to all men.^ 
 
 This is Christ's ideal : a radiating gospel : 
 a kingdom of overflowing, conquering love ; a 
 1 Titus ii. 11. 
 
Service 311 
 
 church that is elected to be a means of blessing 
 to the human race.^ This ideal is the very 
 nerve of Christian missions, at home and 
 abroad, the effort to preach the gospel to every 
 creature, not merely because the world needs 
 to receive it, but because the Church will be 
 rejected and lost unless she gives it. 'Tis not 
 so much a question for us whether any of our 
 fellow-men can be saved without Christianity. 
 The question is whether we can be saved if we 
 are willing to keep our Christianity to our- 
 selves. And the answer is. No ! The only 
 religion that can really do anything for me, is 
 the religion that makes me want to do some- 
 thing for you. The missionary enterprise is 
 not the Church's afterthought. It is Christ's 
 forethought. It is not secondary and optional. 
 It is primary and vital. Christ has put it into 
 the very heart of His gospel. We cannot 
 really see Him, or know Him, or love Him, 
 unless we see and know and love His ideal for 
 us, the ideal which is embodied in the law of 
 election to service. 
 
 For this reason the spirit of missions has Missions 
 
 , , , . , . p . essential to 
 
 always been the saving and puritymg power Qfiristian- 
 of the Christian brotherhood. Whenever and Hy- 
 wherever this ideal has shined clear and strong, 
 1 See Appendix, note C^6. 
 
312 
 
 Service 
 
 Missions 
 emancipated 
 the early 
 church. 
 
 Missions 
 keep the 
 gospel pure. 
 
 it has revealed the figure of the Christ more 
 simply and more brightly to His disciples, and 
 guided their feet more closely in the way of 
 peace and joy and love. 
 
 In the first century it was the spirit of for- 
 eign missions that saved the Church from the 
 bondage of Jewish formalism. Paul and his 
 companions could not live without telling the 
 world that Christ Jesus came to seek and save 
 the lost — lost nations as well as lost souls. 
 The heat of that desire burned up the fetters 
 of bigotry like ropes of straw. The gospel 
 could not be preached to all men as a form of 
 Judaism. But the gospel must be preached to 
 all men. Therefore it could not be a form of 
 Judaism. The argument was irresistible. It 
 was the missionary spirit that made the Eman- 
 cipation Proclamation of Christianity. 
 
 In the dark ages the heart of religion was 
 kept beating by the missionary zeal and efforts 
 of such men as St. Patrick, and St. Augustine, 
 and Columba and Aiden, and Boniface, and 
 Anskar, who brought the gospel to our own 
 fierce ancestors in the northern parts of Europe 
 and wild islands of the sea. In the middle 
 ages it was the men who founded the great 
 missionary orders, St. Erancis and St. Dominic, 
 who did most to revive the faith and purify 
 
S 67' vice 313 
 
 the life of the Church. And when the Refor- 
 mation had lost its first high impulse, and 
 sunken into the slough of dogmatism ; when 
 the Protestant churches had become entangled 
 in political rivalries and theological controver- 
 sies, while the hosts of philosophic infidelity 
 and practical godlessness were sweeping in 
 apparent triumph OA^er Europe and America, 
 it was the spirit of foreign missions that 
 sounded the reveille to the Christian world, 
 and lit the signal fire of a new era — an era of 
 simpler creed, more militant hope, and broader 
 love — an era of the Christianity of Christ. 
 The desire of preaching the gospel to every 
 creature has drawn the Church back from her 
 bewilderments and sophistications closer to the 
 simplicity that is in Christ, and so closer to that 
 divine ideal of Christian unity in which all 
 believers shall be one in Him. You cannot 
 preach a complicated gospel, an abstract gos- 
 pel, to every creature. You cannot preach a 
 gospel that is cast in an inflexible mould of 
 thought, like Calvinism, or Arminianism, or 
 Lutheranism, to every creature. It will not 
 fit. But the gospel, the only gospel which is 
 divine, must be preached to every creature. 
 Therefore, these moulds and forms cannot be an 
 essential part of it. And so we work our way 
 
314 Service 
 
 back out of the tangle of linman speculations 
 toward that pure, clear, living message which 
 Paul carried over from Asia to Europe, the 
 good news that God is in Christ, reconciling 
 the world to Himself. 
 One mes- This is the gospel for an age of doubt, and 
 
 many ways ^^^ ^11 ^ges wherein men sin and suffer, question 
 of preach- ^j-^j despair, thirst after righteousness and long 
 for heaven. There are a thousand ways of 
 preaching it, with lips and lives, in words and 
 deeds ; and all of them are good, provided only 
 the preacher sets his whole manhood earnestly 
 and loyally to his great task of bringing home 
 the truth as it is in Jesus to the needs of his 
 brother-men. The forms of Christian preach- 
 ing are manifold. The spirit is one and the 
 same. New illustrations and arguments and 
 applications must be found for every age and 
 every race. But the truth to be illuminated 
 and applied is as changeless as Jesus Christ 
 Himself, in whose words it is uttered and in 
 whose life it is incarnate, once and forever. 
 The types of pulpit eloquence are as different 
 as the cliaracters and lanoi-uasres of men. But 
 all of them are vain and worthless as sound- 
 ing brass and tinkling cymbals, unless they 
 speak directly and personally and joyfully 
 of that divine love which is revealed in 
 
Service 315 
 
 Christ in order that all who will believe in 
 it may be saved from doubt and sin and self- 
 ishness in the everlasting kingdom of the lov- 
 ing God. 
 
 This is the gospel which began to shine The oni 
 through the shadows of this earth at Bethlehem, ^^^^^ ' 
 where the Son of God became the child of Mary, 
 and was manifested in perfect splendour on 
 Calvary, where the Good Shepherd laid down 
 His life for the sheep. For eighteen centuries 
 this simple, personal, consistent gospel has been 
 the leading light of the best desires and hopes 
 and efforts of humanity. It is the one bright 
 star that shines, serene and steady, through the 
 confusion of our perplexed, struggling, doubting 
 age. He who sees that star, sees God. He 
 who follows that star, shall never perish. It has 
 dawned upon my heart so clearly and so con- 
 vincingly that the one thing I have cared and 
 tried to do in these lectures is to make it plain 
 that this is the essence of Christianity, the only 
 gospel that is worth preaching in all ways to 
 all men, that Jesus Christ is God who loves us 
 in order that we may learn to love one another. 
 But if I have failed to make this view of reli- 
 gion clear, if an imperfect utterance has be- 
 clouded and obscured the message, at least let 
 this last word be plain, at least let nothing hide 
 
The last 
 loord. 
 
 316 S 67' vice 
 
 from your soul or from mine, this supreme, 
 saving truth of election to service. 
 
 The vision of God in Christ is the greatest 
 gift in the world. It binds tliose who receive 
 it to the highest and most consecrated life. To 
 behold that vision is to be one of God's elect. 
 But for our own souls the result of that election 
 depends upon the giving of ourselves to serve 
 the world for Jesus' sake. Noblesse oblige. 
 Believers Let US not miss the meaning of Christianity 
 
 in Christ, . i i . 
 
 the servants ^^ ^^ comes to US and claims us. We are 
 of God's love choscu, we are called, not to die and be saved, 
 
 to the lohole -, ^ ^ i mi 
 
 loorid. but to live and save others. The promise of 
 
 Christ is a task and a reward. For us there is 
 a place in the army of God, a mansion in the 
 heaven of peace, a crown in the hall of victory. 
 But whether we shall fill that place and dwell 
 in that mansion and wear that crown, depends 
 upon our willingness to deny ourselves and take 
 up our cross and follow Jesus. Whatever our 
 birthright and descent, whatever our name 
 and profession, whatever our knowledge of 
 Christian doctrine and our performance of 
 Christian worship may be, — when the great 
 host is gathered in the City of God, with 
 tattered flags and banners glorious in their 
 bloodstained folds, with armour dinted and 
 swords worn in the conflict, with Avounds which 
 
Service 317 
 
 tell of courage and patient endurance and 
 deathless loyalty, — when the celestial knight- 
 hood is assembled at the Round Table of the 
 King, our name will be unspoken, our crown 
 will hang above an empty chair, and our place 
 will be given to another, unless we accept now, 
 with sincere hearts, the only gospel which can 
 deliver us from the inertia of doubt and the 
 selfishness of sin. We must enter into life by 
 giving ourselves to the living Christ who un- 
 veils the love of the Father in a Human Life, 
 and calls us with Divine Authority to submit 
 our Liberty to God's Sovereignty in blessed 
 and immortal Service to our fellow-men for 
 Christ's sake. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 FORE-WORD 
 
 Note 1. — ^' Every living preacher must receive - 
 his message in a communication direct from God, 
 and the constant purpose of his life must be to 
 receive it uncorrupted, and to deliver it without 
 addition or subtraction. 
 
 " It is a truism, but, I think you will all agree, 
 a neglected truism. If in our brief better moments 
 we see it, we constantly are tempted to recede from 
 it. Not without some susi^icion of what may be 
 involved in unflinchingly accepting it as true, we 
 are apt to take refuge in modifications, compro- 
 mises, denials. Flesh shrinks, and the heart cries 
 out. Let some one else go up the rugged steep of 
 the mountain and see Him face to face. Let some 
 one else stand awestruck in the passing of the 
 Almighty. I will do some humbler task. Let me 
 read the lessons, or let me recite the creed, or let 
 me be a priest, clad in the robes of office which 
 are a discharge from personal fitness. On many 
 grounds and in many ways we disclaim our calling. 
 The truth remains as a truism, but we dare not 
 Y 321 
 
322 Appendix [Fore-word 
 
 grasp it ourselves. The world notices our dis- 
 
 claimerj and accepts us on the level of our own 
 
 elected degradation." — Egbert F. Horton, Ver- 
 bum Dei (Macmillan, 1893), p. 17. 
 
 Note 2. — ^' So much of the preaching to-day 
 seems to be preaching to yesterday, or preaching 
 about yesterday. It does not touch as it ought 
 the contemporary life, and grapple with its prob- 
 lems, its duties, its difficulties, its dangers. There 
 is, in consequence, a sense of unreality about it, a 
 foreignness, a far-away-ness ; and to men who are 
 of necessity preoccupied with the exigencies of con- 
 temporary life, it is not helpful preaching. . . . 
 We should try to make them understand that there 
 is a heaven here in this world, and a hell here in 
 this world, and that those who at present are living 
 in this world are in this heaven or in this hell. 
 And Jesus comes as light, we should try to make 
 them understand, to show them how to get out of 
 the hell which is here, or the hell-fire v/hich is here, 
 into the heaven which is here. . . . We should try 
 to teach men and women to-day that the way in 
 which to use the light of another world shining in 
 Jesus Christ, is not to stand gazing up into heaven 
 and acquiring thus a kind of spiritual myopia, or 
 shortsightedness, which prevents them from seeing 
 clearly the forms of duty immediately about them, 
 but to walk on the earth in the light of that other 
 world which in Jesus Christ so brightly and beauti- 
 fully appears." — David H. Greer, The Preacher 
 and His Place (Scribners, 1895), pp. 46, 47. 
 
Lecture I] Appe7ldix 323 
 
 '^Pere Gratry says, 'It is not enough to utter 
 the mysteries of the Spirit, the great mysteries of 
 Christianity, in formulas, true before God, but not 
 understood of the people. The apostle and the 
 X^rophet are precisely those who have the gift of 
 interpreting these obscure and profound formulas 
 for each man and each age. To translate into the 
 common tongue the mysterious and sacred language 
 ... to speak the word of God afresh in each age, 
 in accordance with both the novelty of the age and 
 the eternal antiquity of the truth, this is what St. 
 Paul means by interpreting the unknown tongue. 
 But to do this, the first condition is that a man 
 should appreciate the times he lives in. "Hoc 
 autem tempus quare non probatis.'' ' " — Lux Mundi 
 (John Murray, London, 1890), p. viii. 
 
 LECTUEE I 
 
 Note 3. Page 5. — "Je ne crois pas ^noncer 
 une verite bien neuve en affirmant que la Littera- 
 ture est un de ces elements, le plus important 
 peut-etre, car dans la diminution de plus en plus 
 evidente des influences traditionnelles et locales, 
 le Livre devient le grand initiateur. II n'est 
 aucun de nous qui, descendu au fond de sa con- 
 science, ne reconnaisse qu'il n'aurait pas ete tout 
 a fait le meme s'il n'avait pas lu tel ou tel ouvrage; 
 poeme ou roman, morceau d'histoire ou de j^hiloso- 
 phie. A cette minute precise, et tandis que j'ecris 
 cette ligne, un adolescent, que je vols, s'est accoude 
 
324 Appendix [Lecture 1 
 
 sur son pupitre cl'etndiant par ce beau soir d'un 
 jour de juin. Les fleurs s'oiivrent sous la fenetre, 
 amoureusement. L'or tendre du soleil couche 
 s'etend sur la ligne de Thorizon avec une deli- 
 catesse adorable. Des jeunes lilies causent dans 
 le jardin voisin. L'adolescent est penche sur son 
 livre, peut-etre un de ceux dont il est parle dans 
 ces Essais. C'est les Fleurs du Mai de Baudelaire, 
 c'est la Vie de Jesus de M. Renan, c'est la Sa- 
 lammbo de Flaubert, c'est le Thomas Graindorge de 
 M. Taine, c'est le Eouge et le Noir de Beyle. . . . 
 Qu'il ferait mieux de vivre! disent les sages. . . . 
 Helas! c'est qu'il vit a cette minute, et d'une vie 
 plus intense que s'il cueillait les fleurs parfumees, 
 que s'il regardait le melancolique Occident, que 
 s'il serrait les fragiles doigts d'une des jeunes 
 filles. II passe tout entier dans les phrases de son 
 auteur prefere. II converse avec lui de coeur a 
 coeur, d'homme a homme. II I'ecoute prononcer 
 sur la maniere de gouter I'amour et de pratiquer la 
 debauche, de chercher le bonheur et de supporter 
 le nialheur, d'envisager la mort et I'au dela tene- 
 breux du tombeau, des paroles qui sont des revela- 
 tions. Ces paroles I'introduisent dans un univers 
 de sentiments jusqu'alors aperQu a peine. De cette 
 premiere revelation a imiter ces sentiments, la dis- 
 tance est faible et l'adolescent ne tarde guere a la 
 franchir. Un grand observateur a dit que beaucoup 
 d'hommes n'auraient jamais ete amoureux s'ils 
 n'avaient entendu parler de I'amour." — Paul 
 BouRGET, Essais de Psychologie Contemporaine 
 (Paris, 1895), p. vi. 
 
Lecture I] Appendix 325 
 
 " It may be alleged that the popular opinion is 
 merely a reflection of the popular literature, and 
 that the truth of the assumption I am calling in 
 question is generally believed by the many who 
 read, simply because it is constantly asserted by 
 the few who write. This no doubt is accurate, and 
 up to a certain point is an explanation. There 
 exists now a kind of literature, already large and 
 of growing importance, produced by experts for 
 the benefit of those who desire to be 'generally in- 
 formed ' ; which, unlike most ephemeral literature, 
 leads public opinion rather than follows it. Of 
 course the greater part of this, whether it consists 
 of handbooks or of review articles, lias no bearing 
 whatever on the relation which ought to exist be- 
 tween Eeligion and Science, or Avith the positive 
 evidence that may exist for either. But just as 
 popular accounts of chemistry, physiology, or his- 
 tory appear in answer to the natural desire of an 
 educated but busy public for as much knowledge 
 as possible, about as many things as possible, with 
 as little trouble as possible; so there are easily 
 found eminent authors anxious to purvey for that 
 apparently increasing class of persons who aspire 
 to be advanced thinkers, but who like to have their 
 advanced thinking done for them." — A. J. Bal- 
 four, A Defence of Philosophic Doubt (Macmillan, 
 1879), p. 308. 
 
 Note 4. Page 7. — "With sorrow and reluctance 
 it must be confessed that the majorit}' of Oxford 
 and Cambridge undergraduates are without, or at 
 
326 Appendix [Lecture! 
 
 least profess to be without^ any religious beliefs 
 at all. There are, of course, many exceptions. 
 Exceptions, however, they remain ; certainly the 
 greater number are Gallios so far as the church 
 is concerned." — Article in The Nineteenth Century, 
 October, 1895, in "The Religion of the Under- 
 graduate." Things are not quite so bad in the 
 United States, but in France and Germany they 
 are worse. 
 
 Note 5. Page 11. — Among these books, which 
 take a distinctly spiritual and religious view of 
 evolution, some of the most interesting have been 
 written in America. The Idea of God, and The 
 Destiny of Man, by John Fiske ; Agnosticism and 
 Religion, by President Schurman of Cornell Uni- 
 versity; The Evolution of Christianity, by Dr. 
 Lyman Abbott; and Moral Evolution, by Prof. 
 George Harris of Andover, may be named as 
 works of great value to the student who w^ishes 
 to understand the deeper tendencies of modern 
 thought. One of the first of undoubtedly orthodox 
 theologians to assert that the theory of evolution 
 is not hostile to religion, was President James 
 McCosh of Princeton. The general course of the 
 argument as it is developing in the light of science 
 to-day, may be seen in the following extracts from 
 the writings of Dr. John Fiske. 
 
 "The Darwinian theory, properly understood, 
 replaces as much teleology as it destroys. From 
 the first dawning of life we see all things work- 
 ing together toward one mighty goal, the evolu- 
 
Lecture I] Appendix. 327 
 
 tion of the most exalted spiritual qualities which 
 characterize Humanity. The body is cast aside 
 and returns to the dust of which it was made. 
 The earth, so marvellously wrought to man's 
 uses, will also be cast aside. The day is to 
 come, no doubt, when the heavens shall vanish 
 as a scroll, and the elements be melted with fer- 
 vent heat. So small is the value which Nature 
 sets upon the perishable forms of matter! The 
 question, then, is reduced to this: Are Man's 
 highest spiritual qualities, into the production of 
 which all this creative energy has gone, to dis- 
 appear with the rest? Has all this work been 
 done for nothing? Is it all ephemeral, all a bub- 
 ble that bursts, a vision that fades? Are we to 
 regard the Creator's work as like that of a child, 
 who builds houses out of blocks, just for the pleas- 
 ure of knocking them down? For aught that 
 science can tell us, it may be so, but I can see no 
 good reason for believing any such thing. On 
 such a view the riddle of the universe becomes a 
 riddle without a meaning. Why, then, are we 
 any more called upon to throw away our belief in 
 the permanence of the spiritual element in Man 
 than we are called upon to throw away our belief 
 in the constancy of Nature? The more thoroughly 
 we comprehend that process of evolution by which 
 things have come to be what they are, the more we 
 are likely to feel that to deny the everlasting per- 
 sistence of the spiritual element in Man is to rob 
 the whole process of its meaning. It goes far 
 toward putting us to permanent intellectual con- 
 
328 Appendix [Lecture I 
 
 fusion, and I do not see that any one has yet 
 alleged, or is likely to allege, a sufficient reason 
 for our accepting so dire an alternative." — John 
 FisKE, The Destiny of Man (Houghton, Mifflin, 
 & Co., 1895), pp. 113-116. 
 
 "As to the conception of Deit}^, in the shape 
 impressed upon it by our modern knowledge, I 
 believe I have now said enough to show that it 
 is no empty formula or metaphysical abstraction 
 which we -would seek to substitute for the living 
 God. The infinite and eternal Power that is mani- 
 fested in every pulsation of the universe is none 
 other than the living God. We may exhaust the 
 resources of metaphysics in debating how far his 
 nature may fitly be expressed in terms applicable 
 to the physical nature of Man ; such vain attempts 
 will only serve to show how we are dealing with a 
 theme that must ever transcend our finite powers 
 of conception. But of some things we may feel 
 sure. Humanity is not a mere local incident in 
 an endless and aimless series of cosmical changes. 
 The events of the universe are not the work of 
 chance, neither are they the outcome of blind 
 necessity. Practically there is a purpose in the 
 world whereof it is our highest duty to learn the 
 lesson, however well or ill we may fare in render- 
 ing a scientific account of it. When from the 
 dawn of life we see all things working together 
 toward the evolution of the highest spiritual at- 
 tributes of Man, we know, however the words may 
 stumble in which we try to say it, that God is in 
 
Lecture I] Appendix 329 
 
 tlie deepest sense a moral Being. The everlasting 
 source of phenomena is none other than the in- 
 finite Power that makes for righteousness. Thou 
 canst not by searching find Him out; yet put thy 
 trust in Him, and against thee the gates of hell 
 shall not prevail; for there is neither wisdom nor 
 understanding nor counsel against the Eternal." 
 — ■ John Fiske, The Idea of God (Houghton, 
 Mifflin & Co., 1886), pp. 166, 167. 
 
 " So, as we look back over the marvellous life- 
 history of our planet, even from the time when there 
 was no life more exalted than that of conferva scum 
 on the surface of a pool, through ages innumerable 
 until the present time, when man is beginning to 
 learn how to decipher nature's secrets, — we look 
 back over an infinitely slow series of minute adjust- 
 ments, gradually and laboriously increasing the 
 points of contact between the inner life and the 
 world environing it. Step by step in the upward 
 advance toward humanity the environment has 
 enlarged, from the world of the fresh-water alga, 
 with its tiny field and its brief term of existence, 
 to the world of civilized men, which comprehends 
 the stellar universe during aeons of time. Every 
 such enlargement has had reference to actual exist- 
 ences outside. The eye w^as developed in response 
 to the outward existence of radiant light, the ear 
 in response to the outward existence of acoustic 
 vibrations. The mother's love came in response 
 to the infant's needs. Fidelity and honour were 
 gradually developed as the nascent social life 
 
330 Appendix . [Lecture I 
 
 required them. Everywhere the internal adjust- 
 ment has been brought about so as to harmonize 
 with some actually existing external fact. Such 
 has been nature's method: such is the deepest law 
 of all life that science has been able to detect. 
 
 "Now there was a critical moment in the history 
 of our planet, when love was beginning to play a 
 part hitherto unknoAvn, when the notions of right 
 and wrong were germinating in the nascent human 
 soul, when the family was coming into existence, 
 when social ties were beginning to be knit, when 
 winged words first took their flight through the 
 air. Tliis is the mo7nent when the process of evo- 
 lution ivas being shifted to a higher plane, when 
 civilization was to be superadded to organic evolu- 
 tion, when the last and highest of creatures was 
 coming upon the scene, when the dramatic purpose 
 of creation was approaching fulfilment. At that 
 critical moment we see the nascent human soul 
 vaguely reaching forth toward something akin to 
 itself, not in the realm of fleeting phenomena, 
 but m the eternal presence beyond. An internal 
 adjustment of ideas was achieved in correspond- 
 ence with an unseen world. That the ideas were 
 very crude and childlike, that they were put 
 together with all manner of grotesqueness, is what 
 might be expected. The cardinal fact is that the 
 crude, childlike mind was groping to put itself 
 into relation with an ethical world not visible to 
 the senses. And one aspect of this fact not to be 
 lightly passed over is the fact that religion, thus 
 set upon the scene coeval ivith the birth of human- 
 
Lecture I] Appendix 331 
 
 %, has played such a dominant part in the subse- 
 quent evolution of human society that tvhat history 
 would he tvithout it is quite beyond our imagina- 
 tion. As to the dimensions of this cardinal fact, 
 there can thus be no question. None can deny 
 that it is the largest and most ubiquitous fact con- 
 nected with the existence of mankind upon the earth. 
 
 "Now, if the relation thus established, in the 
 morning twilight of man's career, between the 
 human soul and the world invisible and immaterial, 
 is a relation of which only the subjective term is 
 real and the objective term is non-existent, then I 
 say it is something utterly without i^recedent in 
 the whole history of creation. All the analogies 
 of evolution, so far as men have been able to 
 decipher it, are overwhelmingly against any such 
 supposition. All the analogies of nature fairly 
 shout against the assumption of such a breach of 
 continuity between the evolution of man and all 
 previous evolution. So far as our knowledge of 
 nature goes, the whole momentum of it carries us 
 forward to the conclusion that the unseen world, as 
 the objective term in a relation that has coexisted 
 with the whole career of mankind, has a real exist- 
 ence; and it is but following out the analogy to 
 regard that unseen world as the theatre where the 
 ethical process is destined to reach its full consum- 
 mation. 
 
 " TJie lesson of evolution is that through all these 
 lueary ages the human soid has not been cherishing 
 in religion a delusive phantom; but, in spite of 
 seemingly endless groping and stumbling, it has 
 
332 Appendix [Lecture I 
 
 been rising to the recognition of its essential kin- 
 ship ivith the everliving God. Of all the implica- 
 tions of the doctrine of evolution with regard to mayi, 
 I believe the very deepest and strongest to be that 
 ivhich asserts the everlasting reality of religion.^'' — 
 Christian Literature. February, 1896. " The Ever- 
 lasting Reality of Religion." p. 428. 
 
 Note 6. Page 17. — "It has been said that fic- 
 tion is harmful not so much by what is put in it 
 as by what is left out. A few grains of wit, a 
 leaven of literary skill, and a little of fancy go far 
 to neutralize the septic properties of romance. 
 The most harmful of all are — at least for young 
 and unlearned people — the class usually styled 
 'harmless,' because the Seventh Commandment is 
 never mentioned in them. These, tossed aside by 
 mature readers, are read by the young in default 
 of better: these ruin mind and weaken imagina- 
 tion, give false and sickly views of life, degrade 
 taste, and enervate both character and feeling." — 
 Article by " Maxwell Grey " in The Nineteenth Cen- 
 tury. January, 1896. "The Influence of Fiction." 
 
 Note 7. Page 24. — " At first sight it might seem 
 that these two kinds of pessimism, the popular and 
 instinctive, and the philosophic and reasoned, have 
 nothing to do with one another, and that no light 
 can be thrown on the latter by the earlier develop- 
 ment. It is, no doubt, true that modern German 
 pessimism as a philosophy of existence must be 
 examined and estimated on its own grounds, and 
 
Lecture I] Appendix 333 
 
 be accepted or rejected according as it shows itself 
 to be or not to be a consistent and well-reasoned 
 system of thought. At the same time, the full 
 significance of this speculative doctrine cannot be 
 understood except by a reference to pre-philosophic 
 pessimism. Systems of philosophy do not spring 
 from pure isolated intellect, but are the products 
 of concrete minds made up in part of certain emo- 
 tional and moral peculiarities which mould and 
 colour in numberless particulars their intellectual 
 workmanship. It is at least a priori supposable 
 that the j)hilosophic pessimists partake somewhat 
 of those habits of feeling and thought which under- 
 lie the more popular type of pessimism." — James 
 Sully, Pessimism (Appleton, 1891), pp. 2, 3. 
 
 Note 8. Page 28. — "II y a d'abord dans Baude- 
 laire nne conception particuliere de Pamour. On 
 la caracteriserait assez exactement, semble-t-il, par 
 trois epithetes, d'ordre disparate comme notre soci- 
 ete. Baudelaire est tout a la fois, dans ses vers 
 d'amour : mystique, libertin, et analyseur. ... II 
 est libertin, et des visions depravees jusqu'au 
 sadisme troublent ce meme homme qui vient 
 d'adorer le doigt leve de sa Madone. Les niornes 
 ivresses de la Venus vulgaire, les capiteuses ardeurs 
 de la Venus noire, les raffinees delices de la Venus 
 savante, les criminelles audaces de la Venus san- 
 guinaire, ont laisse de leur ressouvenir dans les 
 plus spiritualises de ses poemes. ... A travers 
 taut d'egarements, oil la soif d'une infinie purete 
 se melange a la faim devorante des joies les plus 
 
334 Appendix [Lecture I 
 
 pimentees de la chair, I'intelligence de I'analyseur 
 reste cruellement maitresse d'elle-meme. La mys- 
 ticite, comme le libertinage, se codifie en formules 
 dans ce cerveau qui decompose ses sensations, avec 
 la precision d'un prisme decomposant la lumiere. 
 Le raisonnement n'est jamais entame par la fievre 
 qui bride le sang ou par I'extase qui evoque les 
 chimeres. Trois liommes a la fois vivent dans 
 cet homme, unissant leurs sensations pour mieux 
 presser le coeur et en exprimer jusqu'a la derniere 
 goutte la seve rouge et cliaude. Ces trois liommes 
 sont bien modernes, et plus moderne aussi est leur 
 reunion. La fin d'une foi religieuse, la vie a Paris, 
 et I'esprit scientifique du temps out contribue a 
 faQonner, puis a fondre ces trois sortes de sensi- 
 bilites, jadis separees jusqu'a paraitre irreducti- 
 bles I'une a I'autre, et maintenant liees jusqu'a 
 paraitre inseparables, an moins dans cette creature, 
 sans analogue avant le XIX^ siecle franqais, qui 
 fut Baudelaire." — Bourget, PsycJiologie Contem- 
 porai7ie, pp. 5, 6, 8. 
 
 Note 9. Page 29. — '^ So liat Sudermann vor 
 wenigen Woclien auf dem litterarisclien Congress 
 in Dresden unumwunden auf Ibsen, Tolstoi und 
 Zola als die eigentlicben Lehrmeister seiner Gen- 
 eration liingewiesen. Welcher Meinung, liber die 
 Walil dieser Muster man audi sein mag, gewiss ist 
 dass diese strengen und liberstrengen Eichter ilirer 
 Mitmensclien iliren deutsclien Jlingern niclit zu 
 geben vermochten, was ihnen selbst fehlte : innere 
 Harmonic. Ganz im Geiste ilirer Vorbilder gingeii 
 
Lecture I] Appendix 335 
 
 unsere Neuerer mit grausamer Freude den Scliaden 
 und Schwachen miserer kranken Welt nach. Uii- 
 bekiimmert um die welthistorischen Yorgange im 
 Zeitalter Bismarcks, fernab von jedem Yersiich 
 oder Verdacht einer byzantinischen Litteratur 
 waren und blieben sie das bose Gewissen ihrer 
 Landsleute. Bald gab es kein verborgenes oder 
 offenes Laster der herrschenden Klassen, kein 
 kleines oder grosses Leid unserer Arbeiter und 
 Bauern, das uns nicht auf den Biilinen und in den 
 Bilcliern deutscher Naturalisten beimgesucht hatte. 
 Drama und Eoman spielten sicli auf das Wunder- 
 werkzeug binaus, von dem ein feiner Humorist 
 getraumt und gescherzt hat : das Mish^ophoyi. Wie 
 der Apseolonius in Otto Ludwigs ' Zwischen Him- 
 mel und Erde' batten unsere Neusten den Katzen- 
 jammer von den Eauschen, die sicb Andere antran- 
 ken." — Antox Bettelheim, CosmopoUs, January, 
 1896, pp. 272, 273. 
 
 Note 10. Page 34. — '^ Karl Peters is undoubt- 
 edly right, when he says of the systems both of 
 Frauenstadt and of Hartmann, that they represent 
 the transition to Theism without knowing it. ' I 
 maintain that the Philosophy of the Unconscious 
 represents the transition from Pantheism to Theism. 
 ... As in Schopenhauer we have the transition 
 from an idealistic to a realistic, so in Hartmann 
 there is executed the transition from a pantheistic 
 to a theistic Weltanschauung. The former, indeed, 
 believed himself to stand on quite the other side, 
 and no doubt the latter also thinks that he is 
 
336 Appendix [Lecture IJ 
 
 planted on the opposite bank. But as Schopen- 
 hauer coukl not prevent the historical development 
 from growing beyond his standpoint, so Hartmann 
 will seek in vain to guard himself against such a 
 breaking up of his system. . . . Ed. v. Hartmann's 
 Unconscious is an almighty and all-wise Providence, 
 raised above the world-process, which comprehends 
 and holds within itself the whole world-develop- 
 ment.' " — James Orr, D.D., The Christian View 
 of God and the World (New York, 1893), p. 457. 
 
 LECTUEE II 
 
 Note 11. Page 46. — " Gradually one phenome- 
 non after another of those discovered and attested 
 by De Puysegur, Esdaile, Elliotson, etc., has been 
 admitted into orthodox science under some slightly 
 altered name. Certain phenomena, rarer and more 
 difficult to examine, but attested by the same men 
 with equal care, are still left in the outer court of 
 the scientific temple. But when one has seen the 
 somnambulic state, the insensibility under opera- 
 tions, etc., which were once scouted as fraudulent 
 nonsense, becoming the commonplaces of the lect- 
 ure-room, one can await with equanimity the gen- 
 eral acceptance of the thought-transference and 
 the clairvoyance which, from De Puysegur 's day 
 onwards, have repeatedly occurred in the course of 
 those same experiments — experiments which some- 
 times ruined the careers of those who made them, 
 but which are now recognized as epoch-making in 
 a great department of experimental psychology." 
 
Lecture IIJ Appendix 337 
 
 " The time for a priori chains of argument, for 
 the subjective pronouncements of leading minds, 
 for amateurish talk and pious opinion, has passed 
 away; the question of the survival of man is a 
 branch of Experimental Psychology. Is there, or is 
 there not, evidence in the actual observed phenom- 
 ena of automatism, apparitions, and the like, for 
 a transcendental energy in living men, or for an 
 influence emanating from personalities which have 
 over-passed the tomb? This is the definite ques- 
 tion which we can at least intelligibly discuss, and 
 which either we or our descendants may some day 
 hope to answer." — F. W. H. Myers, Science and 
 a Future Life (Macmillan, 1893), pp. 34, 44. 
 
 Note 12. Page 47. — "N'ow it is surely not 
 unreasonable to surmise that there are limitations 
 in the nature of the universe which must circum- 
 scribe the achievements of speculative research. 
 Every astronomer knows that there was only one 
 secret of the universe to be discovered, and that 
 when Newton told it to the world the supreme 
 triumph of astronomy was achieved. AVhether 
 Darwin or some one else shall have disclosed the 
 other great mystery of the generation of life, it is 
 none the less certain that all future triumphs will 
 be insignificant by the side of the first luminous 
 hypothesis. Chemistry rests, Avhen all abatements 
 have been made, on the atomic theory, and even if 
 future investigation enables us to forecast with 
 absolute precision what the result of combinations 
 hitherto unattempted will be, so that we can calcu- 
 
338 Appendix [Lecture II 
 
 late in tlie study what is now worked out grop- 
 ingly in the laboratory, that discovery would 
 hardly eclipse the merit of Dalton^s contribution 
 to science. So it is in every department of 
 research. Even the greatest men are little more 
 than sagacious interpreters of thought and toil 
 which others have expended obscurely. The dis- 
 covery of a new metal, a new star, or a new species 
 is now nothing to thrill us with wonder and awe. 
 We know that it has been worked up to by former 
 experiments or is the result of improved instru- 
 ments, and is no more matter of wonder than that 
 this year's best steamship should make a knot an 
 hour more than was possible five years ago. Then 
 again, not only is science ceasing to be a prophet, 
 but in virtue of her very triumphs, precisely be- 
 cause her thoughts are passing into the life-blood 
 of the world, is she losing visible influence as a 
 liberal educator. It is coming to be matter of 
 history that she has taught us to substitute law 
 for caprice in our conceptions of the Divine will; 
 that she has relegated the belief in secondary 
 causes and the belief in arbitrary interpositions of 
 the First Cause to the lumber-room of fable ; that 
 she has given us a broader and intenser view of 
 nature, while she has left us the fairyland of the 
 world's childhood for an appreciable treasure. 
 Other harvests have now been gathered in. The 
 prophet and leader is rapidly becoming a hand- 
 maid. Her possibilities can be pretty accurately 
 summed up or forecast in a cyclopaedia; and having 
 delivered herself of her one imperishable protest 
 
Lecture II] Appendix 339 
 
 against popular theology, she has no other great 
 moral truth to declare." — Charles H. Pearson, 
 National Life and Character (Macmillan, 1893), 
 p. 291. 
 
 "But in truth if (as is commonly assumed) our 
 discoveries are confined to the physical side of 
 things, there is no ground whatever for this san- 
 guine liope. Admitting that the visible universe 
 is, in relation to our present faculties, practically 
 infinite, it by no means follows that our means of 
 scrutinizing it are capable of indefinite improve- 
 ment. And, in fact, we find the true pioneers 
 of science greatly more cautious in their prog- 
 nostic. We begin to hear that telescopy and 
 microscopy (which in their brief existence have 
 suggested so many more problems than they have 
 solved) are already approaching ominously near to 
 their theoretic limit. We begin to recognize in 
 the length of the light-wave an irreducible bar to 
 that scrutiny of the 'infinitely little' which we 
 most urgently need. We begin to feel that the 
 sensitiveness of the retina, the percipient power 
 of the brain, however supplemented by sensitive 
 apparatus, must always be inadequate to the more 
 delicate tasks which we would fain assign to them ; 
 and in short that the human body, developed for 
 quite other purposes, must always be a rude and 
 clumsy instrument for the apprehension of abstract 
 truth. And more than this. Vast as is the visible 
 universe, infinite as may have been the intelligence 
 which went to its evolution, yet while viewed in 
 
340 Appendix [Lecture II 
 
 the external way in which alone we can view it, 
 — while seen as a product and not as a plan, — it 
 cannot possibly suggest to us an indefinite number 
 of universal laws. Such cosmic generalizations as 
 gravitation, evolution, correlation of forces, con- 
 servation of energy, though assuredly as yet unex- 
 hausted, cannot in the nature of things be even 
 approximately inexhaustible.'' — Science and a 
 Future Life, p. 72. 
 
 Note 13. Page 48. — "Here terminated the first 
 part of our inquiry. Its general result is to show 
 (1) that from the particular knowledge obtained 
 by observing the phenomena of a world assumed 
 throughout this part of the essay to be persistent, 
 no scientific conclusions could be drawn; and (2) 
 that even if we suppose these phenomena to be 
 part of a world governed by causation, we were not 
 much advanced, and that, therefore, (3) some 
 further principles or modes of inference have need 
 to be discovered before Science is placed on a 
 rational foundation. Of these 'further principles, ' 
 since their nature is altogether unknown, no more 
 notice has been taken. 
 
 " Assuming then that the arguments attacked are 
 fairly representative of English Philosophy at the 
 present time — as is, I think, the case — and assum- 
 ing, as I am bound to do, that the answers here 
 given to those arguments are effective, we may say 
 that Science is a system of belief which, for any- 
 thing we can allege to the contrary, is wholly 
 without proof. The inferences by which it is ar- 
 
Lecture II] Appendix 341 
 
 rived at are erroneous; the premises on which it 
 rests are unproved. It only remains to show that, 
 considered as a general system of belief, it is inco- 
 herent: and this task is undertaken in the two 
 chapters which together form the Third Part. 
 
 "The first of these (namely, Chapter XII.) is 
 devoted in the main to showing that there is a 
 discrepancy between the facts which Science asserts 
 to be its (particular) premises and the facts which 
 it puts forward as its ultimate conclusions. But 
 besides this principal contention, it is shown inci- ' 
 dentally that the universe, as it is represented to 
 us by Science, is wholly unimaginable, and that 
 our conception of it is what in Theology would be I 
 termed purely anthropomorphic. * 
 
 "The chief argument of Chapter XII. is, how- 
 ever, only indirectly connected with this subject, 
 its principal end being to contrast the world as it 
 appears with the world as Science assures us that it 
 is, and to show that the scientific reasoning which 
 makes our knowledge of the second depend logically 
 upon our knowledge of the first, is inadmissible. 
 
 "The fact that the two are in contradiction, is 
 flagrant and undeniable — ^as any one may see who 
 considers that while perception gives us immediate 
 knowledge of the existence of coloured objects. 
 Science tells us that this appearance is really due 
 either to the vibration of uncoloured particles, or 
 to reflection from uncoloured surfaces. It is also, 
 I imagine, evident that no integral part of a sys- 
 tem can contradict the premises of that system 
 without introducino; confusion and incoherence 
 
342 Appendix [Lecture II 
 
 into the whole; and finally, it must be admitted 
 that since our actual scientific system does rest 
 upon the data given in perception, and since its 
 conclusions are in contradiction with these data, it 
 must be regarded as incoherent and confused." — 
 Arthur James Balfour, A Defence of Philo- 
 sopliic Doubt (Macmillan, 1879), pp. 284, 285, 
 287-289. 
 
 Note 14. Page 52. — "With the growth of 
 knowledge Theology has enlarged its borders until 
 it has included subjects about which even the most 
 accomplished theologian of past ages did not 
 greatly concern himself. To the Patristic, Dog- 
 matic, and Controversial learning which has 
 always been required, the theologian of to-day 
 must add knowledge at first hand of the complex 
 historical, antiquarian, and critical problems pre- 
 sented by the Old and New Testaments, and of 
 the vast and daily increasing literature which has 
 grown up around them. He must have a sufficient 
 acquaintance with the comparative history of reli- 
 gions ; and, in addition to all this, he must be com- 
 petent to deal with those scientific and philosophical 
 questions which have a more profound and perma- 
 nent bearing on Theology even than the results 
 of critical and historical scholarship." — Arthur 
 James Balfour, The Foundations of Belief (Long- 
 mans, 1895), p. 1. * 
 
 "What manner of man must he be, who is to 
 give epoch-making expression to the new con- 
 
Lecture II] Appendix 343 
 
 sciousness of Christ, it is not difficult to imagine. 
 He must know the method of physical science, and 
 be in sympathy with its great generalizations; he 
 must be at home in the kingdom of thought, 
 familiar with tlie noble and fruitful ideas in phi- 
 losophy, a companion of the imperial thinkers of 
 the race; he must have at his tongue's end the 
 salient facts of Christian history, and the funda- 
 mental conceptions and distinctions of historic 
 theology; he must be a master of the new biblical 
 learning, widely and deeply versed in the classical 
 literatures of the world, and able to work in the 
 consciousness of the true interpretation of the re- 
 ligions of the world; and, in addition to all this, 
 he must have original power. For this apparatus 
 of learning is but the introduction to such work as 
 to-day needs to be done." — George A. Gordon, 
 The Christ of To-day (Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 
 1896), pp. 31, 32. 
 
 Note 15. Page 55. — "All human language^ all 
 human observation, implies that the mind, the 'I,' 
 is a thing in itself, a fixed point in the midst of 
 a world of change, of which world of change its 
 own organs form a part. It is the same yesterday, 
 to-day, and to-morrow. It was what it is when its 
 organs were of a different shape, and consisted of 
 different matter from their present shape and mat- 
 ter. It will be what it is when they have gone 
 through other changes. I do not say that this 
 proves, but surely it suggests, it renders probable, 
 the belief that this ultimate fact, this starting- 
 
344 Appendix [Lecture II 
 
 point of all knowledge, thought, feeling, and lan- 
 guage, this 'final inexplicability ^ (an empliatic, 
 though a clumsy phrase), is independent of its 
 organs ; that it may have existed before they were 
 collected out of the elements, and may continue to 
 exist after they are dissolved into the elements. 
 The belief thus suggested by the most intimate, 
 the most abiding, the most wide-spread of all 
 experiences, not to say by universal experience, 
 as recorded by nearly every word of every lan- 
 guage in the world, is what I mean by a belief in 
 a future state, if indeed it should not rather be 
 called a past, present, and future state, all in one, 
 a state which rises above and transcends time and 
 change. I do not say that this is proved, but I do 
 say that it is strongly suggested by the one item 
 of knowledge which rises above logic, argument, 
 language, sensation, and even direct thought, that 
 one clear instance of direct consciousness in virtue 
 of which we say 'I am.' This belief is that there 
 is in man, or rather that man is that which rises 
 above words and above thoughts, which are but 
 unuttered words ; that to each one of us, 'I' is 
 the ultimate central fact which renders thought 
 and language possible." — Sir James Fitzjames 
 Stephen, Liberty, Equality, Fraternity. Quoted by 
 Hutton, Contemporary Thought and Thinkers, I., 
 p. 114. 
 
 Note 16. Page 56. — ^"Now personality is the 
 inevitable and necessary starting-point of all 
 human thought. For we cannot by any conceiv- 
 
Lecture II] Appendix 345 
 
 able means get out of it, or behind it, or beyond 
 it, or account for it, or imagine the method of 
 its derivation from anything else. For, strictly 
 speaking, we have no knowledge of anything else 
 from which it can have been derived. If we are 
 told that it is the product of pure reason, or uncon- 
 scious will, or mere matter, or blind force, the 
 answer is obvious — that we know of no such 
 things. For, when spoken of in this way, reason 
 and will and matter and force are only abstrac- 
 tions, and abstractions from my personal experi- 
 ence; that is to say, they are parts of myself, 
 separated from their context and then supposed to 
 exist in the other world; or, to put the same thing 
 in another way, they are phenomena of the outer 
 world, which are supposed to resemble parts of 
 myself taken out of their context. But it is only 
 in their context that these parts of me have any 
 real existence. Will, in the only form in which 
 I know it, is determined by reason and desire. 
 Matter, in the only form in which I know it, — 
 that is, in my own body, — is informed by reason 
 and desire and will. Eeason, as I know it, is 
 inseparable from desire and will. And when in 
 my own case I speak of my 'reason' or my 'will' 
 apart, I am making abstraction of a particular 
 aspect of myself, which, as such, has only an 
 ideal or imaginary existence. Consequently, names 
 which are given to phenomena in virtue of their 
 resembling or being supposed to resemble these 
 abstract aspects of myself, must be equally ideal 
 and imaginary in their denotation. And I cannot 
 
346 Appendix [Lecture II 
 
 in any way conceive a living and complex whole, 
 like myself, to be derived from anything outside 
 me which can only be known and named because it 
 resembles one of my elements; when the element 
 in question must be artificially isolated and, so to 
 speak, killed in the process, before the resemblance 
 can be established. Abstractions must be less real 
 than the totality from which they are taken, and 
 cannot thus be made levers for displacing their 
 own fulcrum. Personality, therefore, is ultimate 
 'a parte ante.'" — J. R. Illingworth, Person- 
 ality Human and Divine (Macmillan, 1894), pp. 
 41-43. 
 
 "The comparative failure of metaphysical think- 
 ers in the past has been due simply and entirely, I 
 take it, to their having adopted false starting-points 
 and worked with false methods. Metaphysics, like 
 charity, should begin at home. Though it must be 
 metempirical in the sense of being concerned with 
 what is not 'reducible to sensation,' it need not, 
 and should not, be metempirical in the wider sense 
 of the term experience, which embraces the whole 
 of consciousness. The true beginning of meta- 
 physics is personality, or the existence of an ego. 
 Here we may find an immovable foundation. If it 
 can be shown that feeling could not exist without 
 an ego, then it is absurd to maintain, as the Posi- 
 tivists do maintain, that the ego cannot exist 
 because it is not a feeling. . . . 
 
 "The denial of Personality is the denial of 
 knowledge. Without a metaphysical ego there 
 
Lecture II] Appendix 347 
 
 could be neither memory nor sensation. The 
 attempt to disprove the existence of such an ego 
 is only rendered apparently successful by that 
 existence being throughout assumed. Its very 
 negation is tantamount to its affirmation; for 
 without this principle of permanence the concepts 
 employed in its denial could not possibly have 
 been formed. In other words, the personality, 
 which should be the beginning of metaphysics, 
 is essential to the conception and statement of 
 every anti-uietaphysical argument." — Alfred 
 Williams Momekie, Personah'tj/, the Beginning 
 and End of Metaphysics and a Necessary Assump- 
 tion in all Positive Philosophy (Blackwood, 1889), 
 pp. 23, 132. 
 
 Note 17. Page 58.^ — "Christianity is histori- 
 cal in its antecedents. It is the fulhlment of 
 Judaism, which was in its very idea definitely 
 prospective, and only really intelligible through 
 the end to which it led. The Covenant with 
 Abraham included the promise of which the later 
 religious history of 'the people,^ working through- 
 out for and in 'the nations,' was the gradual 
 accomplishment. The c^ll of Abraham was the 
 beginning of the universal life of Faith. For as 
 Christianity was the goal of the revelations of the 
 Old Testament, so it was also the answer to the 
 questions of the whole prae-Christian world, 
 the satisfaction of the aspirations of the 'many 
 nations ' with whom in the order of Providence 
 the 'people' was brought into contact. 
 
348 Appendix [Lecture II 
 
 "Christianity is historical in itself. It is not a 
 code of laws; it is not a structure of institutions; 
 it is not a system of opinions. It is a life in 
 fellowship with a living Lord. The Work and 
 the Person of Christ, this is the Gospel, both as 
 it was proclaimed by the Lord Himself, and as it 
 was proclaimed by His Apostles: the revelation, 
 the gift, the power, of a perfect human life offered 
 to God and received by God, in and with which 
 every single human life finds its accomplishment. 
 The laws, the institutions, the opinions, of Chris- 
 tendom are the expression of the life which works 
 through them. In Christianity the thoughts by 
 which other religions live are seen as facts. 
 
 "Christianity is also historical in its realization. 
 All human experience must be a commentary on 
 the perfect human Life. The new life which was 
 communicated to men requires for its complete 
 embodiment the services of all men. The fuller 
 meaning of the Faith in Him Who is the Way and 
 the Truth and the Life is slowly mastered through 
 the ages by the ministry of nations and by the 
 ministry of saints and heroes through which the 
 thoughts of the nations are interpreted. Such a 
 process must go on unhastingiy, unrestingly, irre- 
 versibly to the end of time; and if anything can 
 make us feel the nobility of life, it must be that 
 in Christ we are enabled to recognize in the whole 
 course of history a majestic spectacle of the action 
 of Divine love in which no failures and no wil- 
 fulness of men can obliterate the signs and the 
 promise of a Presence of God." — Bkooke Foss 
 
Lecture II] Appendix 349 
 
 Westcott, Bishop of Durham, The Gospel of Life 
 (Macmillan, 1892), pp. 255-257. 
 
 Note 18. Page 59. — "Thus far our task is 
 accomplished; however briefly and hastily, the 
 outer conditions of the life of Christ have been 
 spread before us. But it would be an unpardon- 
 able omission, if even here special attention were 
 not invited to the fact that these are utterly irrec- 
 oncilable with the vaunted mythical theory. The 
 ablest expositor of this theory, while admitting a 
 certain basis of historical truth in the Christian 
 Gospels, denies altogether their authenticity as 
 histories, and maintains that the life which they 
 delineate, like the ancient mythologies of Greece 
 and Eome, is fabulous rather than historical. 
 What seem to be facts he pronounces myths, shad- 
 owing forth certain spiritual truths, and these he 
 labours to show were the very truths most firmly 
 believed by the nation in connection with the 
 expected Messiah. His avowed purpose is to 
 prove that by the aid of their imagination the 
 writers of the Gospels wrought up the scanty 
 materials which they possessed into a series of 
 fables, each containing a spiritual meaning, and 
 that meaning always in harmony with their tradi- 
 tionary ideas, and even suggested by them. 
 
 "With the utmost confidence we can defy con- 
 tradiction when we assert that these principles are 
 incapable of being applied to that series of facts 
 which has formed the subject of the short review 
 we have just finished. With whatever plausibility 
 
350 Appendix [Lecture II 
 
 they may be brought to bear upon other parts of 
 the evangelical narrative, it will baffle the most 
 dexterous criticism to adjust them to this portion 
 of it: < The corrupt and debasing influences amid 
 which Jesus grew up in the village of Nazareth ; ' 
 the shortness of His earthly course, and its 
 ' ignominious close; ' — ' His poverty. His humble 
 trade as a carpenter, and His want of education 
 and of worldly x^atronage,' — these are the things 
 which we have put forward as the outer conditions 
 of Christ's life. These were not only not in har- 
 mony with the Messianic ideas of the Jews at that 
 time, or indeed at any time, but they were dia- 
 metrically opposed to them. We make bold to 
 maintain that they Avere the very last things 
 which a Jew would ever have dreamed of connect- 
 ing with the life of his Messiah. They are not 
 Messianic; the most unscrupulous ingenuity can 
 never construe them into myths, or make them 
 harmonize with national and traditionary fancies. 
 Whatever be fable, these are certainly facts, and 
 would have been eagerly concealed, if they had not 
 been received and undeniable facts; and these facts 
 are all that are now demanded, as the basis on 
 which to found an argument for the true divinity 
 of Christ. 
 
 " Jesus was a resident in the village of Nazareth 
 till He was thirty years of age. He died in com- 
 parative youth, when He was only thirty-three 
 years old. He was a working carpenter; poor, 
 unknown, untaught, inexperienced, and unbe- 
 friended. We shall go to some obscure hamlet 
 
Lecture II] Appendix 351 
 
 of our land, known chiefly for the extreme prof- 
 ligacy of its inhabitants; we shall go to the 
 workshop of a carpenter there, to a young man at 
 the bench, earning his bread by the labour of his 
 hands, remarkable only because, amid the sur- 
 rounding vice, he has preserved himself uncon- 
 taminated; we shall go to this youthful artisan, 
 not yet thirty years of age, born of humble 
 parents, brought up in a condition of poverty, 
 associating only with the poor, in no way con- 
 nected with the rich, the learned, the influential, 
 or receiving assistance, or even countenance from 
 them; we shall go to this poor young man, who 
 has had no intercourse with cultivated society, no 
 access to books, no time for reading and study, no 
 education but the commonest, and no outward 
 advantages of any kind above others in his humble 
 station, from his birth till that time. Such, in 
 simple historical truth, such exactly was Jesus of 
 Nazareth; and these were the very conditions un- 
 der which He developed His future character, aiul 
 rose to His future position." — Jotin Young, The 
 Christ of History (Robert Carter & Bros., 1855). 
 pp. 52-54. 
 
 Note 19. Page 62. — "The argument to the 
 Divinity of Christ from his claim, has been re- 
 cently put afresh, as part of a personal experi- 
 ence, in An Appeal to Unitarians, by 'A Convert 
 from Unitarianism ' (Longmans, 1890), pp. 41-51. 
 ' If it is not superhuman authority that speaks to 
 us here, it is surely superhuman arrogance.' It 
 
352 Appendix [Lecture II 
 
 has, however, been chiefly brought home to men's 
 minds, in recent times, by Pere Lacordaire {Jesus 
 Clirist, Conf. 1) and Dr. Liddon." — Chaeles 
 GoKE, The Incarnation of the Son of God (Scrib- 
 ners, 1891), p. 266. 
 
 Note 20. Page 65. — "The Church is a unit 
 under the lordship of Christ. This thought is 
 most fully developed in First Corinthians, where 
 the apostle sets it in contrast with the party-spirit 
 which prevailed at Corinth, and in Ephesians, 
 where it is introduced as a corollary of the 
 supreme headship of Christ over the Church. 
 The unity and harmony of all Christians in the 
 Church are illustrated by various figures. One of 
 the most common is that of the members as consti- 
 tuting one body: 'We, who are many, are one 
 body in Christ, and severally members one of 
 another ' (Rom. xii. 5) ; ' For as the body is 
 one, and hath many members, and all the mem- 
 bers of the body, being many, are one body; so 
 also is Christ' (1 Cor. xii. 12); that is, 'just as 
 the case stands with the body, that its many mem- 
 bers make up its unity, so also does it stand in 
 like manner with Christ, whose many members 
 likewise constitute the unity of His body ' (Meyer 
 in loco). In Ephesians the headship of Christ 
 over the Church as His body is yet more explicitly 
 asserted in contrast to modes of thought which 
 degraded Christ from His pre-eminent position, 
 and which had become rife in the churches in Asia 
 Minor, although the apostle does not here draw 
 
Lecture II] Appendix 358 
 
 out the practical lessons regarding tlie function of 
 each member of the body which are so fully devel- 
 oped in 1 Cor. xii. 12-31. Here it is a doctri- 
 nal interest regarding the nature and dignity of 
 Christ's person, while there it was a practical con- 
 cern for the harmony and peace of the Corinthian 
 Church, which determined the course of His 
 thought. It is the divine purpose 'to sum up 
 all things in Christ ' ; that is, to unite all things 
 under one head, in union with Christ (Eph. i, 10). 
 Christ is the unifying bond of all saving powers 
 and processes. God 'hath put all things under 
 His feet, and gave Him to be head over all things 
 to the Church, which is His body' (i. 22). It 
 results from Christ's position and work that man- 
 kind, who were before divided into Jews and 
 Gentiles, are now united into one body by the 
 reconciliation which Christ lias accomplished by 
 His death (ii. 16). It follows that it is the duty 
 of the Christian man to fulfil the function of a 
 member of Christ, and so to promote the strong 
 and healthy growth of the body (iv. 16; Col. ii. 
 19), or, disregarding the figure, to grow in like- 
 ness to Christ, to approach ever nearer to the 
 standard of His perfectness (Eph. iv. 13, 15).'' 
 — GeorcxE B. Stevens, The Pauline Theology 
 (Scribners, 1892), pp. 321-323. 
 
 Note 21. Page 74. — "In character, in spirit- 
 ual insight, in knowledge of man, and of what all 
 men feel must be the truth of God; in ability to 
 see into the very heart of 'human life's mystery ' 
 
354 Appendix [Lecture II 
 
 and to penetrate the depth of humanity's need; 
 in ability to speak the word which His own age 
 needed and all ages since have needed, this Gali- 
 lean peasant, whose youth and young manhood 
 were hlled with monotonous toil ; who had never 
 travelled; who knew few if any books; who had 
 no teacher but a sweet and gracious mother, — has 
 surpassed all the ideal heroes. In a public min- 
 istry of only a few months He transcended the 
 wisdom of tlie philosophers, the intellectual and 
 spiritual forces of the universities, and, more than 
 any other, led men — all men, men of the most 
 diverse tastes and prejudices — toward God. It 
 is impossible for me to think that nature, even 
 as glorious as that in which His youth was spent, 
 taught Him all these lessons. No great poet or 
 artist ever came from the midst of such scener^^. 
 If He is explained by natural environment, the 
 question remains, AVhy has nature produced no 
 successor to Jesus? Switzerland and Thibet have 
 contributed no names to the list of the world's 
 intellectual and spiritual leaders, or even to that 
 of her great artists and poets. Natural environ- 
 ment influences the body, not much the intellectual 
 and spiritual environment. But around this Man 
 the Oriental and the Occidental alike gather, and 
 each seems to find in Him a brother, a teacher, and 
 a friend. 
 
 " There have been many attempts to explain the 
 character and personality of Jesus. My object is 
 not to add another to that list, but rather to show 
 that the data do not exist which warrant any one 
 
Lecture II] Appendix 355 
 
 in attempting to classify Him with other men as a 
 product of heredity and environment. He seems, 
 indeed, to have been without father and without 
 mother. Whoever He was, and whatever the 
 explanation of His presence on this earth of ours, 
 He was an exception among men; not in such a 
 sense as to break the continuity of liumanit3% but 
 clearly to make it impossible to account for Him 
 as we account for heroes and men of genius." — 
 Amohy H. Bradford, Heredity and Christian Prob- 
 lems (Macmillan, 1895), p. 266. 
 
 Note 22. Page 75. — "But there is another 
 form of satisfaction which He has rendered which 
 is even deeper and more intense than this. Jesus 
 Christ has satisfied humanity in the relief which 
 He has brought to it under the consciousness of 
 sin. There is really no experience which can 
 compare in intensity with the experience of sin. 
 The reality of sin is not to be confused Avith the 
 experience of it. The reality is universal, the 
 experience is unequal. Some know what sin is 
 by its bitter fruits in their own souls and bodies, 
 or in the souls and bodies of those yet dearer to 
 them than their own; others know what sin is 
 only in principle, through the selfishness which 
 has some lodgment in every heart. Now, as the 
 experience of sin is unequal, so the satisfaction 
 which Christ brings to sinning men is unequal. 
 And no one may argue from any knowledge which 
 he may have of sin, short of the experience of it, 
 how great that satisfaction is which Christ can 
 
356 Appendix [Lecture IIJ 
 
 render. For he who would satisfy liumanity 
 under the consciousness of sin must be able to 
 meet it in its lowest conditions and in its extreme 
 possibilities. But the fact which bears its con- 
 stant witness to the power of Christ is, that when 
 the lowest conditions are reached, and the most 
 extreme possibilities are realized, then the satis- 
 faction is most complete. The saying of Paul 
 is verified a thousand times with every day. 
 'Where sin abounded grace did abound more 
 exceedingly.' 
 
 " It is not to our present purpose to say how this 
 result is brought about. If it were, it might not 
 be possible. No theory is as wide as the fact. No 
 philosophy of the atonement can altogether explain 
 the process by which the sacrifice of Christ finds 
 its sure result in purity and inward peace in the 
 heart of a penitent and believing sinner. All that 
 we can do is to watch the phenomena which attend 
 the method of Jesus. We know that His approach 
 to sin is through His own sinlessness. We can 
 see that His purity wins its way where anything 
 short of that would falter and fail. We know 
 something of the power of His passion for sinners, 
 — how irresistible at times it is, working against 
 the love of sin by 'the expulsive power of a new 
 affection. ' And we know that the method of Jesus 
 is always sacrificial, in its deepest sense vicariously 
 sacrificial, life for life, the cross the standard and 
 the measure of the satisfaction which He imparts 
 to a sinner. So much of the process we can see — 
 and then the result." — The Divinity of Jesus Christ, 
 
Lecture III] Appendix 357 
 
 by the authors of Progressive Orthodoxy (Hough- 
 ton, Mifflin & Co., 1893), pp. 215-217. 
 
 LECTURE III 
 
 Note 23. Page 87. — " The life of the religion, 
 then, lies in the person of its founder; all that it 
 has clone for the race is but a form of His action 
 within and through it. He has given actuality to 
 its theistic beliefs, has been the motive, impulse, 
 and law to all its beneficences. The sense or 
 consciousness of His abiding presence constitutes 
 His Church; the emotions He awakens determine 
 all its worship and all its desires. Even where 
 this seems most concealed, it is yet present as the 
 veritable seat and principle of life. The Virgin 
 may seem to hold the first place in what may be 
 called the more vulgar Roman worship; but she 
 does it not as woman, but as mother; she stands 
 there not in her own right, but by virtue of her 
 Son. The opposite fault has been committed in 
 many an evangelical sermon; the Son has been so 
 preached as to hide the Father, or to deny Him by 
 absorbing those ethical qualities which are most 
 distinctively Divine. But here, too, the Son 
 could not be without the Father, or the Father 
 without the Son; both were needed to the being 
 of either; and so the emphasis on one was only a 
 crude way of expressing their unity. The his- 
 torical fact then remains — the person of Christ 
 has given reality to the life of the Christian relig- 
 ion, and actuality both to its belief in God and 
 
358 Appendix [Lecture III 
 
 to the God it has believed in." — A. M. Fairbairx, 
 The Place of Christ in Modern Theology, p. 381. 
 
 Note 24. Page 90. — "The Christian religion is 
 one phenomenon, a totality, a whole, of which the 
 New Testament is only a part. We of to-day are 
 in actual contact with a living Christianity, which 
 has persisted through nineteen centuries of human 
 chance and change; and though hindered, now as 
 ever, by schism, treachery, hate, flattery, contempt, 
 presents the same essential features which it pre- 
 sented nineteen centuries ago; miracles of peni- 
 tence, miracles of purity, miracles of spiritual 
 power; weakness strengthened, fierceness chast- 
 ened, passion calmed, and pride subdued; plain 
 men and philosophers, cottagers and courtiers, 
 living a new life through the faith that Jesus 
 Christ is God. . . . Now to construct out of the 
 Gospels an imaginary portrait, of One who neither 
 worked wonders nor claimed to be Divine, is to 
 invalidate their worth, for it is to tear them liter- 
 ally into shreds. The conception of Christ, as 
 superhuman, is too completely incorporate in their 
 substance, too subtly inwoven into their tissues, 
 too intimately present in their every line, to be 
 removed by any process short of their destruction 
 as a whole. Moreover, if there were an unknown 
 Christ behind the New Testament, a Christ whom 
 its writers unanimously misrepresented or mis- 
 understood, it Avould not be on this unknown 
 Person, but on His misrepresentation that Chris- 
 tianity is built. For the absolutely central doc- 
 
Lecture III] Ajjpendix 359 
 
 trine round which Christianity has always moved, 
 and which has been the secret of its unique hokl 
 upon the hearts and consciences of men, is not 
 simply the loving Fatherhood of God, but the 
 proof that He has given of His loving Fatherhood, 
 by sending His only-begotten Son into the world. 
 Faith in the Incarnation, with all that it involved, 
 has been the sole and exclusive source of our his- 
 toric Christianity. Yet if Christ were merely 
 man, this was precisely the one point on which 
 either He or His reporters were profoundly wrong. 
 The case therefore is narrowed to a simple issue. 
 Christianity cannot be due to the goodness and 
 wisdom of a man, marred by a pardonable element 
 of error; for it is simply and solely on the sup- 
 posed element of error that it rests ; and its mis- 
 sionaries, its martyrs, its holy and humble men of 
 heart, all of strongest that human souls have done, 
 all of saintliest that human eyes have seen, will 
 have derived their inspiration either from folly or 
 from fraud." — Personality Human and Divine, 
 pp. 196-199. 
 
 Note 25. Page 94. — ''Of itself Son of Man in 
 Hebrew and Aramaic simply means child of man, 
 that is, man, — with perhaps a certain poetic tinge, 
 and with a subordinate conception of dependence 
 and weakness. The expression is frequent in the 
 Old Testament in this sense, and appears in the 
 plural, just as in Mark iii. 28. But though this 
 fundamental meaning could never be lost in any 
 further defining of the conception, it cannot be 
 
360 Appendix [Lecture III 
 
 sufficient in the case of Jesus. As we have already 
 said, Jesus had no need to assure any one in the 
 days of His flesh that He was a child of man ; and 
 the view that He desired — as in the Old Testa- 
 ment phrases, thy servant, thy handmaid (instead 
 of I) — to paraphrase His ego in this way, is 
 destroyed by the twofold consideration that He 
 must then have said this Son of man, and that 
 Jesus, as the Gospels show, did not avoid the 
 simple I. For if, in certain cases. He makes use 
 of the name Son of man instead of the simple I, 
 He manifestly wishes in some way to mark Avhat 
 is peculiar to Himself. . . . Among all the pas- 
 sages in the Old Testament in which the expres- 
 sion Son of man appears, there is only one (Dan. 
 vii. 13) in which it has a Messianic sense: 'I saw 
 in the night visions, and, behold, one like the Son 
 of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came 
 to the Ancient of days, and they brought Him near 
 before Him. And there was given Him dominion, 
 and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations, 
 and languages, should serve Him; His dominion 
 is an everlasting dominion, which shall not be 
 destroyed.' That this passage from Daniel must 
 lie at the basis of Jesus' enigmatic self -designation 
 is now recognized, not indeed universally, but by 
 ever-increasing numbers. And really — when the 
 Book of Enoch, that Jewish, and in part Jewish- 
 Christian Apocalypse of the century of Jesus, has, 
 in virtue of this passage of Daniel, directly 
 stamped the name Son of man as the name of 
 Messiah; when our canonical Apocalypse twice 
 
Lecture III] Appendix 361 
 
 applies Daniel's phrase (I. 13, xvi. 14) to the 
 glorified Christ, and Jesus Himself on two occa- 
 sions unmistakably refers to Dan. vii. 13, when 
 He speaks (Matt. xxiv. 30, xxvi. 64) of the Son 
 of man coming in the clouds of heaven — it is 
 difficult to conceive how any one can object to that 
 origin. The fact lies clearly before us, that the 
 same passage of the Book of Daniel, a book much 
 read and highly honoured in our Lord's day, fur- 
 nishes the conception of the kingdom of heaven, 
 — the eternal kingdom to be received from God in 
 the clouds of heaven, — and the conception of the 
 Son of man, as the receiver and bearer of this 
 kingdom. The mutual relation which we per- 
 ceive, in all the declarations of Jesus, between 
 His character as Son of man and His calling as 
 bringer of the kingdom of God, lies before us 
 originally in that passage of Daniel. And there- 
 with the whole riddle is at bottom solved. The 
 Son of man is the God-invested bearer of the 
 kingdom that descends from above, that is to be 
 founded from heaven; it is He who brings in the 
 kingdom of God." — Dr. Willtbald Beyschlag, 
 New Testament Theology (T. & T. Clark, 1895), Vol. 
 L, pp. 62, 63, 64. 
 
 Note 26. Page 99. — " As regards the apostolic 
 testimony, the ground is happily cleared in modern 
 times by the large measure of general agreement 
 which exists among impartial exegetes as to the 
 nature of the doctrines taught in the several 
 books. The old Unitarian glosses on passages 
 
862 Appendix [Lecturk III 
 
 which seemed to affirm the Divinity of Christ are 
 now seldom met Avith; and it is freely admitted 
 that the bulk of the New Testament writings 
 teach a doctrine of Christ's Person practically as 
 high as the Church has ever affirmed. For in- 
 stance, it is no longer disputed by any competent 
 authority that, in Paul and John, it is the super- 
 natural view of Christ's Person that is given. As 
 to John, — using that name at present for the 
 author of the Fourth Gospel and related Epistles, 
 — his doctrine of Christ is of the highest. This 
 is admitted by the most negative critics, e.g. by 
 Dr. Martineau, who says that the phrase ' Son of 
 God,' applied to the pre-existing Word in the 
 Fourth Gospel, leaves all finite analogies behind. 
 'The oneness with God which it means to mark is 
 not such resembling reflex of the Divine thought 
 and character as men or angels may attain, but 
 identity of essence, constituting Him not godlike 
 alone, but God. Others may be children of God 
 in a moral sense; but by this right of elemental 
 nature, none but He; He is, herein, the only Son; 
 so little separate, so close to the inner Divine life 
 which He expresses, that He is in the bosom of 
 the Father. This language undoubtedly describes 
 a great deal more than such harmony of will and 
 sympathy of affection as may subsist between 
 finite obedience and its infinite Inspirer; it de- 
 notes two natures homogeneous, entirely one; and 
 both so essential to the Godhead that neither can 
 be omitted from any truth you speak of it. It 
 was one and the same Logos that in the beginning 
 
Lecture III] Appendix 36^5 
 
 was witli God, who in due time appeared in human 
 form, and showed forth the Father's pure perfec- 
 tions in relation to mankind, who then returned to 
 His eternal life, with the spiritual ties unbroken 
 which He brought from His finished work.' " — The 
 Christian View of God and the World, pp. 253, 254. 
 
 Note 27. Page 106. — " What fresh characteris- 
 tics, then, has this new revelation to add to the 
 Old Testament teaching about God? He is still 
 One, the only God. He is j)erfect Righteousness, 
 yet, as even the old religion knew, a God of loving- 
 kindness and tender mercy, 'Who wills not the 
 death of the sinner.' But more than all this, He 
 is now revealed to man as Infinite Love, the One 
 Father of humanity, whose only begotten Son is 
 Incarnate and 'made man that we may be made 
 God.' Not one jot or tittle of the old revelation 
 of God, as a God of Righteousness, is lost or can- 
 celled. The moral teaching is stern and uncom- 
 promising as ever. God's love, which is Himself, 
 is not the invertebrate amiability, or weak good- 
 naturedness, to which some would reduce it. 'The 
 highest righteousness of the Old Testament is 
 raised to the completeness of the Sermon on the 
 Mount.' 'The New Testament,' it has been said, 
 ' with all its glad tidings of mercy, is a severe 
 book.' For the goodness and the severity of God 
 are, as it were, the convex and the concave in His 
 moral nature. But what seized upon the imagina- 
 tion of mankind as the distinctive revelation of 
 Christianity was the infinite love and tenderness 
 
364 Appendix [Lecture III 
 
 and compassion of this Eigliteoiis God for sinful 
 man. It was this which shone out in the char- 
 acter of Clirist. He was Very God, with a Divine 
 hatred of evil, yet living as man among men, 
 revealing the true idea of God, and not only real- 
 izing in His human life the moral ideal of man, 
 but by taking human nature into Himself setting 
 loose a power of moral regeneration, of which the 
 world had never dreamed/"' — Lux Mundi (John 
 Murray, London, 1890), pp. 75, 76. 
 
 Note 28. Page 107. — " The constructive thought 
 of Paul starts with the historical person of Jesus, 
 and his primary postulate may be said to be its 
 truth and reality. This historical Person is to 
 him the one and only Messiah. In the Gospels 
 Jesus is a personal, but Christ an official, name, 
 and the two are never interchanged or confounded; 
 but in the Pauline Epistle Christ has become as 
 personal a name as Jesus — i.e. the Person so con- 
 stitutes the office and the office is so incorporated 
 in the Person that distinction has ceased to be pos- 
 sible. . . . Now, it is the distinction of Paul that 
 he made this unity, with all it involved, articulate, 
 and it is also characteristic that the determinative 
 idea in the system which he elaborated with so 
 much dialectical passion came from the personality 
 of Jesus and not from the Messianic office. That 
 idea was His hlial relation, His Divine Sonship. 
 What was to him the primary fact in the con- 
 sciousness of Jesus became the constitutive factor 
 of his own thought. By the revelation of the Son 
 
Lecture III] Appendix 365 
 
 in him he was made a Christian and an Apostle. 
 His Gospel concerned the Son of God, who is 
 God's own Son, His beloved, the Son of His love. 
 This Sonship did not begin with His historical 
 existence, but preceded and even determined it. 
 God sends forth His Son, who exists before He 
 can be sent forth, and comes that He may create 
 in man the spirit of the sonship He Himself has 
 by nature. He, though rich, yet for our sakes 
 becomes poor. He comes out of heaven, descends 
 from above that He may ascend with man re- 
 deemed. Hence there follows a twofold conse- 
 quence, the one affecting the Son, the other the 
 Father. As to the Son, a place and an eminence are 
 ascribed to Him that involve rank and honour. . . . 
 But so to construe Christ is to modify the whole 
 conception of God. Abstract monotheism ceases, 
 and is replaced by a theism which finds within the 
 one Godhead room for both Father and Son. It 
 is the characteristic of the Pauline theology that 
 it is a theology of the Fatherhood which is through 
 the Sonship. Neither can be without the other; 
 both must be together, or neither can be at all. 
 The ideas exist in what we may term a spontaneous 
 rather than an explicated and formulated unity, 
 but they exist and are co-ordinated. The divinity 
 of both Father and Son was affirmed; later thought 
 must determine how their unity could be conceived 
 and expressed. The great thing gained was, 
 Fatherhood and Sonship were as immanent essen- 
 tial to Deity." — The Place of Christ in Modern 
 Theology, pp. 306, 307, 309. 
 
366 ApiJendix [Lecture III 
 
 Note 29. Page 108. — "It is remarkable that 
 the Apostles seem to have experienced no intel- 
 lectual difficulty in regard to this Trinity in the 
 Godhead. I suppose this is to be accounted for, by 
 the fact that difficulties in logic do not trouble us 
 at all where facts of experience are in question. 
 Thus we are often ludicrously at fault in attempt- 
 ing to give a logical account of quite familiar 
 experiences, for example, of the inner relations of 
 those three strangely independent elements of our 
 own spiritual being, will, and reason, and feeling, 
 or of the relation of mind and body. But our in- 
 ability to explain facts logically goes no way at all 
 to alter our sense of their reality. Noav the Apos- 
 tles lived in a vivid sense of experienced inter- 
 course, first with the Son, then with the Father 
 through the Son, later with the Holy Ghost, and 
 with the Father and the Son through the Holy Ghost. 
 This vivid experience, outward and inward, made 
 logical formulas unnecessary. When the formula of 
 the Trinity — three Persons in one Substance — was 
 developed in the Church later on, through the cross- 
 questioning of heresies, it was with many apologies 
 for the inadequacy of human language, and with a 
 deep sense of the inscrutableness of God. The 
 formula was simply intended to express and guard 
 the realities disclosed in the person of Jesus Christ, 
 and great stress was laid on the divine unity. 
 The three Persons are not separable individuals, 
 so that it could be argued that what one of the 
 sacred three does, another does not do, as we com- 
 monly argue about persons amongst ourselves, re- 
 
Lecture III] Ajjpendix 367 
 
 garding each person as separate and exclusive of 
 others. God in three is inseparably one. Thus if 
 He creates, it is the Father through the Son by the 
 Holy Ghost; if He redeems, it is the Father who 
 is the fount of redemption through the Son, by the 
 Holy Ghost; if the Spirit comes, He brings with 
 Him in His coming the Son and the Father, for in 
 eternal subordination and order, the three are one 
 inseparable God." — Gore, The Incarnation of the 
 Son of God, pp. 144, 145. 
 
 '^ If there is a true historical sense in which the 
 clear definition of the doctrine of the Divinity of 
 Jesus Christ must be assigned to the Councils of 
 the fouth and fifth centuries, yet it would be a 
 great historical blunder to state or imagine, as 
 inference, that till then the doctrine was only held 
 partially or with imperfect consciousness in the 
 Catholic Church. The Church did not, as a result 
 of those controversies, develop the consciousness 
 of any new doctrine; the development of her con- 
 sciousness was rather in respect of the shallow but 
 tempting logic which would deform, or the delu- 
 sions which might counterfeit, her doctrine, and 
 of the perils to which these must lead. It may be 
 a question, indeed, how far the words implicit and 
 explicit do, or do not, represent the distinction 
 between the dogmatic consciousness of the Apos- 
 tolic and the Conciliar ages. The difficulty in 
 determining depends solely on this, that the words 
 themselves are used with different meanings. 
 Thus, sometimes men are said to hold implicitly 
 
368 Ajypendix [Lecture III 
 
 what they never perhaps suspected themselves of 
 holding, if it can be shown to be a more or less 
 legitimate outcome, or logical development, of their 
 belief. If such men advance inferentially from 
 point to pointy their explicit belief at a later time 
 may be, in many particulars, materially different 
 from what it had been at an earlier; even though 
 it might be logically shown that the earlier thought 
 was, more or less directly, the parent of the later. 
 Now in any such sense as this we shall stoutly 
 maintain that, from the beginning, the Church 
 held dogmatic truths not implicitly, but explicitly 
 and positively. They who baptized into the three- 
 fold Xame of the Father, and of the Son, and of 
 the Holy Ghost; whose blessing was 'The grace 
 of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and 
 the communion of the Holy Ghost ' ; who, living 
 in the Spirit, lived in Christ; whose highest wor- 
 ship was the Communion of the Body and the 
 Blood of Christ, and whose perfectness of life was 
 Christ; they, so living and worsliipping, did not 
 hold the Godhead of Jesus Christ implicitly; they 
 did not hold something out of which the doctrine 
 of the Trinity might come to be unfolded. On the 
 other hand, you may use the same contrast of 
 words, meaning merely that you have, through 
 cross-questioning or otherwise, obtained a power 
 which you did not possess, of defining, in thought 
 and in words, the limits of your belief, and distin- 
 guishing it precisely from whatever does not belong 
 to it. You hold still what you always meant to 
 hold. You say still what you always meant to 
 
Lecture III] Appendix 369 
 
 say. But it is your intellectual mastery over your 
 own meaning which is altered. Like a person 
 fresh from the encounter of a keen cross-exami- 
 nation, you are furnished now, as you were not 
 before, with distinctions and comparisons, with 
 definitions and measurements, — in a word, with 
 all that intellectual equipment, that furniture of 
 alert perception and exact language, by which you 
 are able to realize for yourself, as well as to define 
 to others, what that meaning exactly is, and what 
 it is not, which itself was before, as truly as it is 
 now, the very thing that you meant. 
 
 "Take, for example, the doctrine of the Holy 
 Trinity. Intellectually it is, of course, antecedent 
 to the doctrine of the Incarnation and the Atone- 
 ment. But it will be observed that it is made 
 known to us not antecedently, but as a consequence 
 of our previous conviction of the Incarnation. 
 Moreover, when it is made known, it is made 
 known rather incidently than directly. Even 
 though it is, when revealed and apprehended, the 
 inclusive sum of our faith, yet there is, in the 
 revelation, no formal unfolding of it, as of a mys- 
 terious truth set to challenge our express contem- 
 plation and worship. There is nothing here to be 
 found in the least corresponding with the explicit 
 challenge, 'Whom say ye that I am' or 'On this 
 rock will I build my church ' ; but rather indi- 
 rectly, so far as our contemplation of the Incarna- 
 tion and its abiding consequences requires for its 
 own necessary interpretation to our understanding, 
 that we should have some insight into the mystery 
 
 2b 
 
370 Appendix [Lecture III 
 
 of the distinction of Persons in the Godhead, so 
 far, and in reference to that purpose, the mystery 
 of the Holy Trinity grows gradually into clearness 
 of revelation to our consciousness." — Lux Mundi, 
 pp. 238, 239, 245, 246. 
 
 "Through all the fierce theological and conse- 
 quently political controversies that disturbed the 
 Church for nearly three centuries after the Great 
 Council, the Nicene Creed survived. It is still 
 the creed of the whole vast Greek Church; with 
 some modifications it is also the creed of the Latin 
 Church; and in its original form and stripped of 
 its condemnatory clauses, it is substantially the 
 creed of universal Christendom. Under the influ- 
 ence mainly of Augustine, the Latin theology soon 
 dominated the Western Church and gradually ex- 
 cluded or suppressed the nobler and richer thought 
 of the Greek Fathers. The Latin theology to some 
 extent obscured, and while seeming to affirm, 
 almost denied, the fundamental and structural 
 doctrine of the Incarnation, the enunciation and 
 persistent defence of which was the chief merit 
 of Athanasius. That doctrine, however, survived 
 through all strife, and now, amidst the changes 
 and even the wreck of creeds, it still survives. In 
 its real essence, it is not an arithmetical threeness 
 of persons inexplicably inhering in one substance, 
 so that we have the impossible conception, — three 
 equals one, — as it so often appears in dogmatic 
 theology; but it is the reality of God in Christ, as 
 the revelation and archetype of God in humanity. 
 
Lecture III] Appendix 371 
 
 [ind the pledge of the perfect fulfilment of man's 
 life by his perfect union with the divine, 'being 
 filled with all the fulness of God.' It is the 
 supreme doctrine of Christianity, — the Incarna- 
 tion, the immanence of God in the realm of per- 
 sonality as well as in the realm of nature." — 
 Philip S. Moxom, From Jerusalem to Niccea (Bos- 
 ton, 1895), pp. 442 ff. 
 
 Note 30. Page 117. — "So far, as it seems to 
 me, the Christian doctrine simply takes up, extends, 
 illuminates, the great natural Law of Evolution. 
 
 " But, as yet, we have not viewed it as distinctly 
 Christian; we have not asked what is the bearing 
 in this aspect of the Manifestation in the fulness 
 of the time of the Son of God, as Son of man. 
 
 "The truth itself of that Manifestation — let us 
 again put this clearly before ourselves, and pro- 
 claim it to the world — is the Divine mystery of 
 mysteries, a secret of the Will and Mature of God, 
 revealed only to faith in the word of Him who 
 said, 'I came forth from the Father and am come 
 into the world; again I leave the world and go 
 unto the Father. ' We should hardly dare to bring 
 it into analogy with the lower manifestations of 
 God to man, if we did not remember that in all 
 analogy the higher reality necessarily transcends 
 the lower, and that our Lord Himself in His Para- 
 bles taught us to shadow out by comparison with 
 earthly things His Kingdom of Heaven. From 
 these lower manifestations, who could have con- 
 ceived beforehand — who can even now comprehend 
 
372 Appendix [Lecture III 
 
 — tlie Personal Incarnation of Goclliead in human- 
 ity? If it may perhaps be foreshadowed by the 
 recognition of the power of God, as immanent in 
 all creation, and more visibly immanent (so to 
 speak) in humanity, yet how dim this foreshadow- 
 ing, compared with the brightness of the reality! 
 
 "But in what way is its actual working in the 
 world represented to us? It is, as we have already 
 seen, described as a ' new Creation ' — the begin- 
 ning of a new spiritual Order — which yet does not 
 break continuity with the past, but, while it brings 
 in a Divine spiritual force before unknown, takes 
 up and subordinates to its higher purpose all the 
 forces of the old Creation. Clearly in this repre- 
 sentation there is a striking analogy to all that has 
 gone before. By what is actually in effect a new 
 Creation — whether it be connected or disconnected 
 with the old — we have seen at each step the intro- 
 duction into the world of a new power, as we pass 
 from the Inorganic realm of lifeless Nature to the 
 realm of Organic Life, from the realm of Organic 
 Life to the realm of Humanity. Now that natural 
 progress is shown to us as carried on to a Supernat- 
 ural perfection by the bringing in of a new Divine 
 Life — at once the Light and the Life of men — enter- 
 ing into the humanity which is the crown and cul- 
 mination of the old development, in order to raise it 
 to unity with the Divine Nature itself. This new 
 Creation is set forth to us as an integral element, 
 as the highest element, of the whole Divine Order; 
 foreordained before the foundation of the world; 
 in some way coexisting with the lower elements 
 
Lecture III] Appendix 378 
 
 in anticipatory power before its actual Mani- 
 festation; prepared for under God's Providence 
 through all 'the fulness of time.' The Manifesta- 
 tion, being in a Personality at once Divine and 
 human, is necessarily complete in itself, unique, 
 unapproachable, begun in the visible life of Christ 
 on earth, continued still in its completeness in the 
 invisible life of heaven. From the nature of the 
 case, its relation to the human personality, as a 
 living power, is a thing supernatural, transcending 
 tlie analogy on which v/e are now dwelling. But 
 yet in its effect both on the individual and on the 
 collective life of all mankind, it is clearly (to use 
 our Lord's own comparison) a seed sown in the 
 spiritual soil of humanity — a leaven infused into 
 its threefold nature — a germ to be developed 
 through the ages of a new dispensation, which is 
 to last till its work shall come to the full possible 
 perfection, and then to give place to a higher dis- 
 pensation still, 'that God may be all in all.' 
 
 " So every way there comes out to us the concep- 
 tion of the development of the Life of Christ in 
 humanity, as the supernatural crown of the great 
 Order of Evolution; and, if this be so. Science, 
 which has traced this order in its lower forms, 
 thus becomes, or should become, the TraiSaywyos to 
 lead us to the liighest in Christ Himself. It is a 
 part of this analogy, that in this highest sphere of 
 the great Order there should be manifested a Law 
 and a Power peculiarly its own. For in the vari- 
 ous provinces of being, which show themselves to 
 us as distinct, the one 'God fulfils Himself in many 
 
3T4 Appendix [Lecture III 
 
 ways.' In one sphere Evolution is ordered through 
 Matter and the physical forces which pervade it; 
 in another there is added in combination with these 
 the new force of Life, with its inner capacity of 
 assimilation and growth; in a third there comes 
 with both and above both the infused life of human 
 personality, with reason, conscience, love, and free- 
 dom of will to use them. Closer and closer in each 
 successive phase there is revealed to us, in relation 
 to created being, the Personality of God, — not His 
 attributes, but Himself. So in this the supernat- 
 ural sphere of the great Order, the new and domi- 
 nant Force should by analogy be, as indeed it is, 
 distinctly Supernatural, in harmony with the lower 
 forces, but distinct from all. For it is the comple- 
 tion of that relation of true personality — all the 
 number numberless of human souls being drawn to 
 the Personality, at once Divine and human, of the 
 Eternal Son, in a communion wrought out by the 
 Eternal Spirit of God, and restoring us to the son- 
 ship of the Eternal Father." — Alfred Barry, 
 Some Lights of Science on the Faith (London, 
 Longmans, 1892), pp. 128-131, 135, 136. 
 
 Note 31. Page 121. — ''Lose out of faith the 
 sense of the Eternal in Christ, fail to recognize in 
 Him the presence of the Absolute, miss the fact 
 that His nature is rooted in the Deity and is part 
 of the nature of God, and we let go the sole ade- 
 quate support for belief in the consubstantiation of 
 humanity with divinity, and the consciousness that 
 Jesus is the moral ideal for mankind. The Christ 
 
Lecture III] Appendix 375 
 
 who embodies the deepest in God, who incarnates 
 the Eternal Filial in the Infinite, is essential to 
 hold for the world the great convictions of the 
 kinship between man and his Maker, and the pres- 
 ence in Jesus of the true and final standard of 
 human life. If the difference in Christ to human- 
 ity is the difference of the very God, then we can 
 believe that the identity in Christ to our race is 
 the identity of tlie very God. But if the contrast 
 in the Lord to mankind does not reach to the being 
 of God, if it is not the manifestation of the Eternal, 
 if it is only individual idiosyncrasy, the mere 
 separate, high-coloured envelope in which His 
 humanity comes into the world and preserves its 
 secrets from the vulgar crowd with whom it must 
 be thrown together, tlien it follows inevitably that 
 the kinship of Christ to His brethren does not 
 carry us to the heart of the universe, does not go 
 beyond the bounds of space and time. Only a 
 Christ whose antithesis to humanity means the 
 presence of tlie very God can by His union with 
 humanity assure us of union with God. Discredit 
 the infinite difference, and we must doubt the sub- 
 lime identity. This contention will be self-evident 
 to those who see that we owe our faith in the 
 humanity of God and in the divinit}^ of man, not 
 primarily to philosophy, but to the power of the 
 historic process. Kevelation is ever through life 
 the apprehension of the Infinite Personality through 
 the finite; philosophy comes afterwards and finds 
 her task. If we take Christ out of the historic 
 process of revelation, we decapitate faith in tlie 
 
376 Appendix [Lecture III 
 
 humanness of God and tlie divineness of man. We 
 must remember the rock whence our belief was 
 hewn, the pit whence it was dug. It was not in 
 the world prior to Christ except in the form of 
 intermittent prophetic dream, limited religious 
 intuition, or vague, ineffectual philosophic fancy. 
 It was not here as the ruling force in human civili- 
 zation. The consubstantiation of man with God is 
 the accepted and moulding belief of Christendom 
 to-day because of the revelation of the nature both 
 of God and man made through Jesus Christ." — 
 Gordon, The Christ of To-day, pp. 119-121. 
 
 LECTURE IV 
 
 Note 32. Page 128. — " The history of art shows 
 us numbers of artists who, grouped around some 
 greater man, imitate his processes, as in the full 
 belief that all there is of art is ]3rocess, or what is 
 sometimes called technique. The greater man has 
 made the dress he wears as the birds make their 
 plumage. The imitator imitates the dress." — 
 John La Faroe, Considerations on Painting (Mac- 
 millan, New York, 1895), p. 26. 
 
 Note 33. Page 131. — "Being thirty years old 
 when He came to be baptized, and then possessing 
 the full age of a Master, He came to Jerusalem, so 
 that He might be properly acknowledged by all as 
 a Master. For He did not seem one thing while 
 He was another, as those affirm who describe Him 
 
Lecture IV] Appendix 377 
 
 as being a man only in appearance ; but what He 
 was, that He also appeared to be. Being a Mas- 
 ter, therefore, He also possessed the age of a 
 Master, not despising or evading any condition of 
 humanity, nor setting aside in Himself that law 
 which He had appointed for the human race, but 
 sanctifying every age, by that period corresponding 
 to it which belonged to Himself. For He came to 
 save all through means of Himself, — all, I say, 
 who through Him are born again to God, — infants, 
 and children, and boys, and youths, and old men. 
 He therefore passed through every age, becoming 
 an infant for infants, thus sanctifying infants; a 
 child for children, thus sanctifying those who are 
 of this age, being at the same time made to them 
 an example of piety, righteousness, and submis- 
 sion ; a youth for youths, becoming an example to 
 youths, and thus sanctifying them for the Lord. 
 So likewise He was an old man for old men, that 
 He might be a perfect Master for all, not merely 
 as respects the setting forth of the truth, but also 
 as regards age, sanctifying at the same time the 
 aged also, and becoming an example to them like- 
 wise. Then, at last, He came on to death itself, 
 that He might be 'the first-born from the dead, 
 that in all things He might have the pre-eminence, ' 
 the Prince of Life, existing before all, and going 
 before all." — Iren^us, Ante- Nicene Library, Vol. 
 I., p. 199. 
 
 The one error against which Ignatius was most 
 careful to warn Christians was the obscuration of 
 
378 Appendix [Lecture 1M 
 
 Christ's humanity. "Stop your ears therefore 
 when any one speaks to you at variance with 
 Jesus Christ who was descended from David, and 
 was also of Mary; who was truly born and did eat 
 and drink. He was truly persecuted under Pon- 
 tius Pilate ; He was truly crucified and truly died, 
 in the sight of beings in heaven and on earth and 
 under the earth." — Epistles of Ignatius to the 
 Trallians, Chap. LX. 
 
 Note 34. Page 140. — " In His mother's womb 
 the body of Christ was also already omnipresent; 
 when He went anywhere, He was in His humanity 
 properly there already; risen from the grave He 
 was in His humanity still in the grave; whilst He 
 hung upon tlie cross, He was also in Athens, and 
 ruled omnipresently the world. Thus the birth 
 of Christ, His movements. His resurrection and 
 ascension, became only an epideictic action, a 
 Docetism which threatens to dissolve completely 
 the condition of humiliation, the learning and 
 growth. At the same time, in order to preserve 
 the truthfulness of the sufferings of Christ, they 
 would speak also of a growing, suffering, and 
 exalted humanity of Christ alongside of one that 
 was from the beginning omniscience, omnipo- 
 tent, and omnipresent. Thus this very energetic 
 striving after the unity of the Person of the 
 God-man ended rather in a double humanity of 
 Christ, a dualism, which renewed all the prob- 
 lems and absolutely rent asunder again the unity 
 of the Person." — Dokner, History of Protes- 
 
Lecture IV] Appe^ldix 379 
 
 tant Theology (T. & T. Clark, 1871), Vol. I., 
 p. 365. 
 
 Note 35. Page 145. — "The Jesus who lived, 
 suffered, and died as a real man on earth is the 
 same personality who was before, as the Logos of 
 God, with the Father, and was God, and by whom 
 all things are made. This is the marvellous prob- 
 lem which has for eighteen centuries exercised the 
 minds of believers. 
 
 " The Logos of God, to whom the Father gives 
 to have life in Himself even as He has, is, as such, 
 eternal; His self-consciousness is therefore eternally 
 clear, His knowledge eternally perfect. His will 
 eternally fixed and holy, and His life eternal 
 bliss. 
 
 " The man Jesus on earth, however, so certainty 
 as His development was really human, was as an 
 embryo and newly born infant without self-con- 
 sciousness. By degrees His self-consciousness is 
 awakened. When He sleeps it is suspended, or, at 
 all events, reduced to a state of obscurity. And 
 when He dies, commending His spirit into the hands 
 of His Heavenly Father, He again loses His self- 
 consciousness, till the moment when the Father 
 quickens Him as to the spirit who was dead as to 
 the flesh (1 Pet. iii. 18). Again, as Jesus was a 
 real child, He was childlike in every respect. He 
 acquired His knowledge gradually (Luke ii. 52, 40). 
 Whenever He fell asleep. His knowledge of God and 
 the world was veiled. Nor was His knowledge of 
 the affairs of the kingdom unlimited, as He Himself 
 
380 Appendix [Lecture IV 
 
 testifies during the very last days of His life (Mark 
 xiii. 32). In fine, it is a matter of course that in 
 the hour of death He lost His knowledge together 
 with His self-consciousness. 
 
 "The development of His will was likewise 
 gradual. His purposes were developed gradually; 
 His will becoming by degrees subject to, or rather 
 identified with, that of His Heavenly Father. He 
 learned obedience (Heb. v. 8). He was, indeed, 
 never disobedient, even in His sorest trials, but on 
 every new trial and suffering He resigned His 
 natural will afresh. This He did even in the final 
 struggle of Gethsemane. At the close of each 
 period of His life He had attained a higher degree 
 of holiness, but not till the close of His earthly 
 career did He attain that perfection of holiness 
 which admits of no further progress. 
 
 "The life of Jesus alternated between feelings 
 of joy and grief; His soul was sometimes shaken 
 to its very profoundest depths. Thus, after His 
 entrance into Jerusalem, it required a struggle for 
 Him to regain His equanimity (John xii. 17). His 
 anguish in the garden caused Him to sweat blood ; 
 and on the cross He gave vent to His feelings in a 
 loud complaint. Now this is the same person, the 
 omniscient, eternally holy and blessed Logos or 
 Jesus, who thus alternates between self -conscious- 
 ness and unconsciousness, who learns by degrees, 
 who now rejoices in spirit (Luke x. 21), and anon 
 is exceedingly troubled. 
 
 " Again, the Logos, having life in Himself even 
 as the Father, is omnipotent, and has shown His 
 
Lecture IV] Appendix 381 
 
 omnipotence by creating and governing the world; 
 but Jesus, as a real man on earth, is not omnipo- 
 tent, but a helpless babe in His mother's womb and 
 on her breast; when a full-grown man requires 
 food and those things to sustain life which are fur- 
 nished by the air, the earthly elements, the light 
 of the sun, etc. ; in the hour of His sorest trial 
 requests His disciples to pray with Him; works 
 even His miracles in His Father's power; lives by 
 the Father, as the disciples live by the glorified Son ; 
 and is, finally, laid in the grave as a helpless 
 corpse. And yet this omnipotent Logos and this 
 humanly dependent Jesus are one and the same 
 person." — Eeubelt, Scripture Doctrine of the Per- 
 son of Christ, based upon the German of W. F. 
 Gess (Andover, Draper, 1871), pp. 318-320. 
 
 "This testimony of Jesus concerning His true 
 humanity, given by His submitting to John's bap- 
 tism, is directly confirmed by God Himself, the 
 Holy Ghost descending and abiding upon Him 
 (Matt. iii. 16; John i. 32). If the incarnate 
 Logos had not been really and truly man, he would 
 not have been in need of this unction with the 
 Spirit and power of God (comp. Acts x. 38). It 
 was this Spirit poured out upon Him after His bap- 
 tism which showed Him the ways and times of His 
 Messianic ministry and sufferings, which led Him 
 after His baptism into the wilderness (Matt. iv. 1 ; 
 Luke iv. 1), and in whose power He went from the 
 wilderness to Galilee (iv. 11). By His forty days' 
 fast in the wilderness also He confesses the reality 
 
382 Appendix [Lecture IV 
 
 of His humanity; for only as a real man did He 
 need to count the cost of the tower to be built by 
 Him, preparation for victory over such an enemy 
 proceeding only from fasting and prayer (Matt, 
 xvii. 21). Again, the temptation of Jesus by the 
 devil rests on the (abstract) possibility of his sin- 
 ning; if it had been absolutely impossible for Him 
 to fall like other men, Satan's temptation would 
 have been an act of folly, not worth recording by 
 the evangelists. And how could Matthew repre- 
 sent this temptation as in keeping with the designs 
 of the Divine Spirit (iv. 1) if Jesus absolutely 
 could not sin? For one who cannot fall, it is mere 
 play to be tempted. Yea, eveu the miracles of 
 Jesus are confessions of His dependence ; for before 
 He healed the deaf-mute. He looked up to heaven 
 and sighed (Mark vii. 34), and at the grave of 
 His friend Lazarus He ascribed His miracles posi- 
 tively to the efficacy of His prayer (John xi. 41, 
 etc.). 
 
 "With this fully agrees His declaration: 'The 
 Father loveth the Son, aud showeth Him all things 
 that Himself doeth ' (John v. 20) ; and again, 
 'Neither has this man sinned, nor his parents, but 
 that tlie works of God should be made manifest in 
 him ' (ix. 3) ; 'Believe the works, that ye may know 
 and believe that the Father is in Me, and I in Him ' 
 (x. 38); 'The Father, that dwelleth in Me, doeth 
 the works ' (xiv. 10). Jesus was, then, not Himself 
 the source from which His miraculous powers flowed, 
 but He obtained them from the Father in answer to 
 His always accepted prayer (comp. what Peter says 
 
Lecture IV] Appendix 383 
 
 in Acts X. 38: 'God was with Him, whereby He was 
 able to do good and heal all that were oppressed of 
 the devil '). — Ibid., pp. 246, 247. 
 
 Note 36. Page 147. — (1) "The Incarnation of 
 the Son of God was no mere addition of a manhood 
 to His Godhead; it was no mere wrapping around 
 the divine glory of a human nature to veil it and 
 make it tolerable to mortal eyes. It was more than 
 this. The Son of God, without ceasing to be God, 
 the Son of the Father, and without ceasing to be 
 conscious of His divine relation as Son to the 
 Father, yet, in assuming human nature, so truly 
 entered into it as really to grow and live as Son of 
 man under properly human conditions, that is to 
 say, also under properly human limitations. Thus, 
 if we are to express this in human language, we 
 are forced to assert that within the sphere and 
 period of His incarnate and mortal life. He did, 
 and as it would appear did habitually, — doubtless 
 by the voluntary action of His own self-limit- 
 ing and self -restraining love, — cease from the 
 exercise of those divine functions and powers, 
 including the divine omniscience, which would 
 have been incompatible with a truly human 
 experience. 
 
 " (2) Jesus Christ, the Son of God incarnate, 
 was and is, at every moment and in every act, both 
 God and man, personally God made man ; He is as 
 truly God at His birth or death as now in His 
 glory, and as truly man now in His glory as for- 
 merly in His human birth and mortal life, but the 
 
384 Appendix [Lecture IV 
 
 relation of the Godhead and manhood is not the 
 same throughout. Now in His glory we must con- 
 ceive that the manhood subsists under conditions 
 of Godhead, 'the glory of God'; but formerly dur- 
 ing His mortal life and within its sphere, the 
 Godhead was energizing under conditions and 
 limitations of manhood. The Son of God really 
 became and lived as Son of man." — Charles 
 Gore, Dissertations, pp. 94, 95. 
 
 Note 37. Page 151. — " Christ Himself expresses 
 His transition from the state of glory, which He had 
 with the Father before the foundation of the world, 
 into this earthly life, in these words: 'The Father 
 has sanctified [set apart and consecrated to reveal 
 the divine life] and sent Me into the world ' (John 
 X. 36; comp. iii, 16, etc.); and again thus: 'I came 
 forth from the Father, and am come into the world ' 
 (xvi. 28); 'I have come down from heaven' (vi. 
 38; iii. 16). The apostles also give prominence 
 now to the one and now to the other of these points 
 of view. Thus John: 'God has sent His only- 
 begotten Son into the world ' (1 John iv. 9), but in 
 another place: 'The eternal life, which was with 
 [toward] the Father has appeared unto us ' (1 John 
 i. 1, etc.), 'The Logos became flesh' (i. 14), 'Christ 
 has come in the flesh' (1 John iv. 2), and thus Paul: 
 'God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, in the 
 similitude of sinful flesh ' (Gal. iv. 4; Eom. viii. 3), 
 but also : ' God [who] was made manifest in the flesh' 
 (1 Tim. iii. 16), 'Jesus Christ became poor for our 
 sakes ' (2 Cor. viii. 9), 'He has divested Himself, 
 
Lecture IV] Appendix 385 
 
 and taken upon Him the form of a servant ' (Phil, 
 ii. 7). His Incarnation is thus both His own act, 
 and in compliance with the will of His Father. 
 The two points of view are connected in Heb. x. 
 5-10, where the Son is represented as saying at 
 His advent, ' Lo ! I come to do Thy will, 
 God!' 
 
 "The Scriptures moreover inform us what took 
 place in the Logos while doing the will of His 
 Father. When Christ says, ' I came forth from 
 My Father, and am come into the world ' ; again, 
 'I leave the world and go unto the Father; and if ye 
 loved Me, ye would rejoice because I said, I go unto 
 the Father' (John xvi. 28; xiv. 28), He declares 
 that He has abandoned His intimate intercourse 
 with His Father, and His relation to the Father has 
 undergone a change. And when He says, 'I am 
 come down from heaven' (John vi. 38; iii. 13), 
 He expresses thereby the fact of His having made 
 Himself loiver. This is both confirmed and more 
 fully developed by Christ's prayer, 'And now, 
 Father, glorify Me with thine own self, with the 
 glory which I had with Thee before the world was ' 
 (John xvii. 5); here Christ declares as pointedly 
 and plainly as language can do it, that at that time 
 He no longer had His ante-mundane glory, and on 
 comparing His declarations in jMark xiii. 32 and 
 John xi. 41 with Mark vii. 31, there is no longer 
 any doubt that the glory with the Father which the 
 Son laid aside at His Incarnation, means, not only 
 His Divine form of existence, or His blessed life in 
 light, but also His omnipotence and omniscience. 
 
 2c 
 
386 ApiJetidix [Lecture IV 
 
 " Of the passages from the apostolic writings let 
 us consider in the first place John i. 14: 'The 
 Logos became flesh.' If every kind of becoming is 
 excluded in the Logos, John certainly chose a very 
 awkward expression. Why did he not rather say : 
 He took upon Himself flesh and blood? John cer- 
 tainly knew what he was about when he expressed 
 this central point of his faith, and thought he made 
 no blunder in the selection of his terms. He wished 
 to say that the Logos in His Licarnation did not 
 remain as He had been before, but that with His 
 assumption of human nature there was a change, 
 introducing 'days of the flesh,' i.e. day of need, 
 weakness, and the possibility of suffering (comp. 
 Heb. V. 7 ; 2 Cor. xiii. 4). This agrees with Christ's 
 own words, that His coming from heaven was a 
 coming down, a going forth from the Father, or 
 from that intimate life-union with Him which He 
 had sustained from all eternity." — Reubelt, 
 Scripture Doctrine of the Person of Christ, pp. 
 329-331. 
 
 "Eternity must not be conceived of as excluding 
 all change. It is only an arbitrary and poor phi- 
 losophy that seeks eternity by a flight from time. 
 The eternity of the Father is conditioned by His 
 aseity, that of the Son and Holy Ghost by the 
 freedom of their life, Avhich streams from out of 
 the Father and is yet identical with that of the 
 Father. The Son divests Himself of His Divine 
 life, of His breathing of the Spirit, and of His 
 government of the world, not because He is invol- 
 
Lectuke IV] Appendix 387 
 
 untarily drawn into subjection to time, but because 
 He freely loves sinners. And after He lias accom- 
 plished His work of love for us, He regains that of 
 which He divested Himself. This His free entrance 
 into time, in order to return again into eternity, is 
 therefore a triumph of eternity over time, an exhi- 
 bition of the Eternal as the king of time, which 
 must serve Him even while He enters into its ser- 
 vice, and which cannot retain Him after He has 
 accomplished His work. To dispose, as a king, of 
 time, so that it does not sustain to the super-tem- 
 poral the relation of an unapproachable something, 
 but is serviceable to it as a form, — this is God's 
 highest revelation of His superiority to time." — 
 Ihkl., p. 430. 
 
 Note 38. Page 159. — " The truth that man was 
 'made in the image of God' admits of two distinct 
 developments. It may be viewed (a) in regard to 
 the individual, or {h) in regard to the race. In 
 both respects man was created to gain a Divine 
 ideal. It is true indeed that neither the race nor 
 the individual can be properly considered apart; 
 each is dependent upon the other for the attain- 
 ment of its perfection. But much is gained both 
 in clearness and fulness of view by considering 
 them separately. 
 
 "(a) It is Avholly unnecessary to inquire in 
 what exact sense man was 'made in the image of 
 God.' We have no faculties for the investigation. 
 There is, however, no authority for limiting the 
 image to any particular part of his nature. For 
 
388 Appendix [Lecture IV 
 
 us the individual man in liis complex being is one ; 
 and as man he was made in God's image to gain 
 His likeness. 
 
 "In this work he had constant need of Divine 
 help. As he was made he was not at once capable 
 of union with God. To reach this consummation 
 he required discipline and training. In the Divine 
 order men are 'first made men and then afterwards 
 gods.' 
 
 " If then man had fulfilled the law of his being, 
 he would still, so far as we can see, have stood in 
 need of a Mediator through whom the relation of 
 fellowship with God might have been sustained, 
 and deepened, and perfected. Nor is it easy to 
 suppose that this fellowship could have been made 
 stable and permanent in any other way than by the 
 union in due time of man with God, accomplished 
 by the union of man with Him who was the Medi- 
 ator between God and man, and in whose image 
 man was made. 
 
 " Irenseus has given a striking expression to this 
 truth. He starts indeed from the consideration of 
 man as fallen, but his argument passes into an 
 absolute form. Speaking of the necessity of the 
 Incarnation, he says: 'If man had not conquered 
 the adversary of man, the enemy would not have 
 been justly conquered. And again, if God had 
 not bestowed salvation, we should not have pos- 
 sessed it surely. And if man had not been united 
 to God, he could not have partaken of incorrup- 
 tion. For it was necessary that the Mediator of 
 God and men by His own essential relationship 
 
Lecture IV] Appendix 389 
 
 with both should bring together into friendship 
 and concord, and on the one hand present man 
 to God and on the other make God known to 
 man. ' 
 
 " Moreover, if we regard the predestined human- 
 ity of the Son of God as the archetype of humanity, 
 light is thrown upon the doctrine of the Atone- 
 ment. It becomes in this case in some degree 
 intelligible how Christ could fitly (if we may so 
 speak) take man's nature upon Him, and suffer for 
 man, inasmuch as He took upon Himself a nature 
 which was not alien in its idea, but one which 
 in some mysterious sense was in its propriety 
 partially an image of His own, though it had 
 fallen. 
 
 " So far, then, the essential constitution of man 
 suggests at least the belief that the Incarnation, 
 by which we understand in this case the taking of 
 sinless and perfected humanity into God, was part 
 of the Divine counsel in creation. 
 
 "(&) These considerations which apply to the 
 individual man obtain greater weight if they are 
 extended to the race. We cannot but believe that 
 under any circumstances, and wholly apart from 
 the Fall, there would have been a progress in the 
 race, as well as in the individual, towards the 
 gradual fulfilment of the idea of humanity. All 
 that was potentially included in man in his various 
 relations to being would have been realized in many 
 parts. In this Avay the whole conception of human- 
 ity would have been broken up and distributed, so 
 to speak, through countless personalities. There 
 
390 Appendix [Lecture IV 
 
 would then have been need of some power by which 
 at last all the scattered elements of manhood should 
 be brought together into a personal unity. In 
 other words, the endeavour to follow out the normal 
 development of the human race leads us to look for 
 that which answers to the Incarnation, by which 
 the completed body might be brought into a final 
 unity in fellowship with God. 
 
 "For Christ, as we are taught, supplies that 
 which gives a common life to all the members. 
 He is the Head of the Body. All the differences 
 of men, so far as they correspond with a true 
 growth, are reconciled in Him, and shown to be 
 contributory to the manifestation of His perfec- 
 tion. 
 
 " In this respect the argument which was drawn 
 from Eph. v. 31 ff., by several early writers, de- 
 serves more consideration than we are at first 
 inclined to give to it. The main idea in the pas- 
 sage seems to be that the Church, the representa- 
 tive of perfected humanity, of that which the race 
 would in the end have been if sin had not inter- 
 vened, is related to a Head, just as in the typical 
 record of Creation woman is related to man. The 
 Church and woman are severally regarded as de- 
 rived, and yet belonging to, the completeness of 
 that from which they are derived, and so destined 
 finally to be restored to perfect fellowship with it. 
 Man ideally is not man only, but man and woman; 
 Christ, such appears to be the thought, however un- 
 familiar it may be to us, unites with the Godhead 
 the ideal of perfected humanity, and that not acci- 
 
Lecture IV] Appendix 391 
 
 dentally but essentially. Tlie personal relation of 
 sex regarded, in typical individuals, represents, as 
 we should express the view, beyond itself a cor- 
 porate relation which exists in respect to the race. 
 Just as the individual union is necessary for the 
 fulfilment of the idea of woman, so the corporate 
 union is necessary for the fulfilment of the idea of 
 humanity. Christ is the true Adam : tlie Church 
 is the true Eve. And both these relations, the 
 individual relation and the corporate relation, are 
 independent of the Fall. The Fall has disturbed 
 and disordered each, but it was not the occasion 
 for the first existence of either. . . . 
 
 "So far we have regarded man only, the indi- 
 vidual and the race. We venture to go yet fur- 
 ther, and to look upon man as the representative 
 of Creation. This thought appears to be dis- 
 tinctly suggested in the records of the Creation, 
 and of the Fall, and of the new Creation. The 
 dominion of man (Gen. i. 2<S) was such that his 
 realm shared the consequences of his sin (Gen. 
 iii. 17). His destiny therefore has not yet been 
 accomplished (Ps. viii. ; Heb. ii. 5 ff.). But in its 
 promised fulfilment lies the hope of the material 
 world. For that something is in store which 
 answers to the redemption of man's body (Rom. 
 viii. 22 ff.). 
 
 "It will at once be obvious how this wider view 
 of the relations of man to Creation tends to con- 
 firm what has been already said of the inherent 
 fitness of the Incarnation in relation to the plan of 
 Creation, as we are enabled to look upon it. In 
 
392 Appendix [Lecture IV 
 
 all parts of the natural order, and not in humanity 
 only, in the very course of progress, there is con- 
 stant division, dispersion, differentiation, of ele- 
 ments ; and at the same time clearer glimpses are 
 opened of a unity to which all the parts appear to 
 tend. This separation, this unity, as far as we can 
 see, belong alike to the essence of things. The 
 separation has been, it is true, influenced by the 
 Fall, but, as a condition of growth, it is not due to 
 it. The idea of the Incarnation therefore satisfies 
 the aspiration towards the vaster unity to which 
 the full development of Creation points. The 
 restoration of unity to man carries with it the 
 promise of the restoration of unity to all finite 
 being." — Westcott, Commentary on the Epistles of 
 John, essay on "The Gospel of Creation," pp. 
 306-310. 
 
 Note 39. Page 161. — " For wherein fought He? 
 In that He took man's nature upon Him. Take 
 away His birth of a virgin, take away that He 
 emptied Himself, 'taking the form of a servant, 
 being made in the likeness of men, and found in 
 fashion as a man ' ; take away this, and where is 
 the combat? where the contest? where the trial? 
 where the victory, which no battle has preceded? 
 'In the beginning was the Word, and the Word 
 was with God, and tlie AVord was God. All things 
 were made by Him, and without Him was nothing 
 made.' Could the Jews have crucified this Word? 
 Could those impious men have mocked this Word? 
 Could this Word have been buffeted? Could this 
 
Lecture IV] Aj^pendix 393 
 
 Word liave been crowned with thorns? But that 
 He might suffer all this, 'the Word was made 
 flesh ' ; and after He had suffered all this, by rising 
 again He 'overcame.'" — St. Augustine, Nicene 
 Fathers, Vol. VI., "Sermons on New Testament 
 Lessons," XLVIII., p. 412. 
 
 Note 40. Page 163. — "Theology has no falser 
 idea than that of the impassibility of God. If He 
 is capable of sorrow, He is capable of suffering; 
 and were He without the capacit}^ for either. He 
 would be without any feeling of the evil of sin or 
 the misery of man. The very truth that came by 
 Jesus Christ may be said to be summed up in the 
 passibility of God. 
 
 "To confine the idea of sacrifice to the Son is 
 to be unjust to His representation of the Father. 
 There is a sense in which the Patripassian theory 
 is right; the Father did suffer, though it was not 
 as the Son that He suffered, but in modes distinct 
 and different. The being of evil in the universe 
 was to His moral nature an offence and a pain, and 
 through His pity the misery of man became His 
 sorrow. But this sense of man's evil and misery 
 became the impulse to speak and to help ; and what 
 did this mean but the disclosure of His suffering 
 by the surrender of the Son? But this surrender, 
 as it Avas the act, represented the sacrifice and the 
 passion of the whole Godhead. Here degree and 
 proportion are out of place ; were it not, we might 
 say the Father suffered more in giving tlian the 
 Son in being given. He who gave to duty had not 
 
394 Appendix [Lecture IV 
 
 the reward of Him who rejoiced to do it. Though 
 we speak but iu the limited language of our own 
 conditions, yet, may we not ask, must not the act 
 by which the Son emptied Himself have affected 
 and, as it were, impoverished the Godhead? The 
 two things are coincident and inseparable; here, 
 pre-eminently, one member could not suffer with- 
 out all suffering. The humiliation of the Son 
 involved the visible passion and death, but the 
 surrender by the Father involved the sorrow that 
 was the invisible sacrifice. 
 
 "And this is the Biblical doctrine : 'God so loved 
 the world that He gave His only-begotten Son'; 
 'He spared not His own Son, but delivered Him 
 up for us all'; 'herein is love, not that we loved 
 God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be 
 the propitiation for our sins.' But what do these 
 verses mean, if not that the essence and act of 
 sacrifice was the surrender of the Son by the 
 Father? It was the measure alike of His love to 
 man and the suffering He endured to save. And so 
 we may say, without the Fatherhood there could 
 be no Atoner and no Atonement; but with the 
 Fatherhood the Atoner and the Atonement could 
 not but be. By their means He, as it were, invited 
 man to come and see sin as He saw it, and judge 
 its evil by beholding through the eternal Son the 
 suffering it cost the eternal Father." — Fairbairx, 
 The Place of Christ in Modern Theology, pp. 483- 
 485. 
 
Lecture V] Appendix 396 
 
 LECTURE V 
 
 Note 41. Page 175. — " I cannot but agree with 
 those who think that the Kingdom of God, in 
 Christ's view, is a present, developing reality. 
 This is implied in the parables of growth (mustard 
 seed^ leaven, seed growing secretly); in the repre- 
 sentations of it, in its earthly form, as a mixture of 
 good and bad (wheat and tares, the net of fishes) ; 
 in the description of the righteousness of the king- 
 dom (Sermon on the Mount), which is to be realized 
 in the ordinary human relations; as well as in 
 many special sayings. I do not see how any one 
 can read these passages and doubt that in Christ's 
 view the kingdom was a presently existing, slowly 
 developing reality, originating in His word, contain- 
 ing mixed elements, and bound in its development 
 to a definite law of rhythm ('first the blade, then 
 the ear,' etc.). On the other hand, the idea has 
 an eschatological reference. The kingdom is not 
 something which humanity produces by its own 
 efforts, but something which comes to it from 
 above. It is the entrance into humanity of a new 
 life from heaven. In its origin, its powers, its 
 blessings, its aims, its end, it is supernatural and 
 heavenly. Hence it is the kingdom of heaven, and 
 two stadia are distinguished in its existence, — an 
 earthly and an eternal; the latter being the aspect 
 that chiefly prevails in the Epistles." — James 
 Okk, The Christian Vieiu of God and the World, 
 pp. 405, 406. 
 
396 Appendix [Lectuke v 
 
 Note 42. Page 181 » — "But we are met on the 
 
 threshold by a modern objection to this provisional 
 conception of the matter. Is doctrine, even in this 
 sense, really the essential content of the Bible? 
 Is not its content, above all, fact and history? As 
 for Christianity in particular, is it not a life in 
 God mediated through Jesus Christ, rather than 
 a doctrine of divine things? The friends of Bibli- 
 cal theology have no wish to deny the truth which 
 underlies these statements ; but it is a half truth, 
 and therefore liable to be misunderstood. To say 
 nothing of the apostles, who, at any rate, taught 
 something concerning Christ, or of Paul, who was 
 certainly one of the greatest teachers in the world's 
 history, the statement that 'Jesus Christ brought 
 no new doctrine, but presented in His person a 
 holy life with God and before God, and in the 
 strength which He drew from that spiritual life 
 He devoted Himself to the service of His brethren 
 in order to win them for the kingdom of God,' is, 
 with all the truth which it contains, one of those 
 misleading statements that oppose things which 
 are not mutually exclusive. No one can deny that 
 Jesus was known by His contemporaries as a 
 'Master,' that is, as a Teacher. His preaching 
 was hailed as a new doctrine (Mark i. 27), and He 
 Himself was conscious that it was His special 
 mission to convey a knowledge of God which was 
 unheard of before Him, and which could not be 
 obtained without Him (Matt. xi. 27). Certainly 
 this knowledge is only the abstract side of the life 
 in God which He unfolds in order to communicate ^ 
 
Lecture V] Appendix 397 
 
 but this new life is anything but an unconscious 
 one ; nor is it imparted by magic, but clothes itself 
 in idea, word, and x^reaching, and thus becomes 
 essentially and necessarily a new doctrine of divine 
 things. Xor is it otherwise with the content of 
 Holy Scripture as a whole. No doubt that content 
 is above all things testimon}^, the attestation of 
 facts of divine revelation; but in the testimony 
 there is thought, in the fact there is idea. What 
 God reveals of Himself is truth to be thought about 
 and to be proclaimed ; that is, of course, doctrine, 
 or doctrinal content." — Dr. Willie ald Bey- 
 SCHLAG, Neio Testament Theology (T. & T. Clark, 
 1895), Vol. I., pp. 2, 3. 
 
 Note 43. Page 183. — " Preaching being the char- 
 acteristic feature of the life of Christ, no true 
 understanding of His mission can be had without 
 a knowledge of what He preached as the truth of 
 God. The Gospels which give us the record of 
 His life contain also a Gospel which He preached ; 
 and this Gospel comprises not only the rules of 
 practical morality, the lessons and precepts of 
 humanity and religion, but the Doctrines of a 
 Positive Theology. It is sometimes alleged that 
 Christ taught personally none of those doctrines 
 which are commonly set forth by the Church in 
 her creeds as distinctive of the Christian faith, 
 but directed His teachings to practical life, incul- 
 cating the virtues, graces, and charities that would 
 reform, adorn, and bless society, and elevate man- 
 kind; that the doctrines of regeneration and atone- 
 
398 Appendix [Lecture V 
 
 ment, of the divinity of Christ and the personality 
 of the Holy Spirit, were woven out of His sayings 
 by speculative minds among His followers, after 
 Jesus had finished His personal testimony of truth 
 and goodness ; that such doctrines owe more to St. 
 Paul and St. Augustine than to Christ, and belong 
 not to the original substance of the Gospel, but to 
 a philosophical theology that has grown up around 
 it. This notion is somewhat favoured by a common 
 method of teaching theology — stating doctrines in 
 technical terms and with scientific nicety, tracing 
 their development in the history of the Church and 
 of schools of philosophy, and finally authenticating 
 them by citations from the Scriptures used mainly 
 as proof-texts. For this purpose the writings of 
 Paul, as the logical expounder of the Christian 
 faith, are drawn upon more largely than other 
 portions of the New Testament — the Pauline con- 
 ception being taken as the basis of the Christian 
 dogmatics, and the words of Jesus being used to 
 verify the statement of His doctrines in the form 
 of theological propositions. To reverse this method 
 is to derive the Christian Theology primarily and 
 directly from the words of Christ — a process in 
 which we have to do not with the creeds of the 
 Church nor the formulas of the theologians, but 
 simply with the principles of interpretation. So 
 far as the very words of Christ have been pre- 
 served, these form the essence of Christianity, just 
 as the original sayings of Socrates as preserved by 
 his disciples are the substance of the Socratic wis- 
 dom. To the first preacher of Christianity must 
 
Lecture V] Appendix 399 
 
 we look for the freshest, truest, best conception of 
 the system. In His words we find a proper the- 
 ology, — not formulated, indeed, nor systematized, 
 yet expressed in doctrines to be severally believed, 
 — doctrines set forth with a certain gradation of 
 time and thouglit, or in a certain order of develop- 
 ment, and these doctrines interwoven with the 
 whole texture of the precepts and promises of the 
 Gos]3el." — Joseph P. Thompsox, The Theology of 
 Christ from His Own Words (Xew York, Scrib- 
 ners, 1871), pp. 2, 3. 
 
 Note 44. Page 185. — "His teaching, therefore, 
 from the very first, has for its background a unique 
 self -consciousness, the incomparable significance of 
 His person, and from the beginning was directed 
 towards something that must be more than teach- 
 ing, that must be work and deed, viz. the founding 
 of God's kingdom. And this founding was finally 
 accomplished, not by His teaching as such, but by 
 His personal devotion to and completion of His 
 life-work, by His death and resurrection. Does 
 His teaching thereby lose its original fundamental 
 significance, and sink down to a mere introduction 
 to New Testament revelation? It must be said 
 that little as the teaching of Jesus in itself, apart 
 from the conclusion of His life, could have called 
 into existence the kingdom of God, as little could 
 that ending of His life have called it into being 
 without the foregoing doctrinal revelation. This 
 doctrinal revelation first induced that end to His 
 life, and gave it meaning; and it alone collected 
 
400 Appendix [Lecture V 
 
 that community of disciples who were able to grasp 
 and propagate that meaning. And therefore His 
 doctrine is not indeed His life-work itself, but the 
 ideal reflection of it, the evidence of what He 
 wished, what He was conscious of being and doing. 
 His teaching, therefore, is that in His appearance 
 and active life which is necessary to make that 
 life intelligible to us, and without Avhich the apos- 
 tolic teaching about Him would only be a sum of 
 dogmatic utterances which we could not compre- 
 hend, and whose truth v\^e could not prove, — a 
 result not a little awkward for that view wliich 
 contrasts the 'teaching of Jesus ' as Christianity 
 proper with the apostolic 'teaching about Christ.' " 
 — Beyschlag, New Testament Theology, Vol. I., 
 pp. 28, 29. 
 
 "Hat sich in der Erscheinung Jesu die voile 
 Gottesoffenbarung vollzogen, so muss dieselbe sich 
 auch als solche der Welt verstandlich gemacht 
 haben. Es liegt im Wesen der Offenbarung, dass 
 dieselbe nicht nur in gewissen Thatsachen bestehen 
 kann, sondern dass sie zugleich die wesentlich 
 richtige Auffassung von der Bedeutung dieser 
 Thatsachen von vornherein sicher stellen muss, 
 und dieses kann bei der in Christo erscheinenen 
 Gottesoffenbarung nur durch das seine Erscheinung 
 begleitende Selbstzeugniss Jesu (im weitesten 
 Umfange) geschehen sein. Auf diesem Selbst- 
 zeugniss Jesu ruht aber selbstverstjindlich und 
 geschichtlich die Auffassung seiner Erscheinung 
 in der altersten N. T. lichen Verkiindisrung:. . . . 
 
Lecture V] Aj^pendix 401 
 
 Die Lehre Jesu war vielmelir ilirem wesentlichen 
 Kern nacli selbst iiiclits anderes als eine Lelire von 
 der Bedeutuug seiner Person u>id seiner Erscliei- 
 nung und musste in dieser Beziehung grundlegend 
 sein fiir die urspriinglichen Vorstellungen der N. T.- 
 liclien Schriftsteller von derselben. Jenielir man 
 die Lehre Jesu in dieser ilirer gescliichtliclien 
 Bedeutung and damit in ihrem eigentliclien Offen- 
 barungscharakter auffasst, um so einfaclier erledigt 
 sich die Frage nach dem Verliiiltniss der Biblisclien 
 Theologie zu den Thatsaclien des Lebens Jesu. 
 Soweit die Lehre Jesu nemlich auf diese That- 
 sachen zuriickweist, um ihre wahre Bedeutung 
 erkennen zu hissen, oder soweit sie dieselben zu 
 ihrem Verstiindniss voraussetzt, werden sie auch fur 
 die Biblische Theologie in Betracht kommen und 
 derselben durcli die Ueberlieferung, aus welcher sie 
 die Lehre Jesu schopft, dargeboten sein. Immer 
 aber wird nur die Lehre Jesu den Ausgangspunkt 
 fiir sie bilden, weil in ihr die Auftassung der 
 iiltesten Yerkiindiger des Evangeliums von der 
 Bedeutung Jesu und seiner Erscheinung wurzelt 
 und damit die Grundlage fiir das A'erstandniss ihrer 
 religiosen Vorstellungen und Lehren gegebcn ist." 
 — Bernhard Weiss, Lehrbuchder Biblischen Theo- 
 logie des Neuen Testaments (2te Aullage, Berlin, 
 1873), pp. 33, 34. 
 
 Note 45. Page 200. — "The philosophers and 
 religionists of old saw truth, but they saw it in 
 detached forms and not as a system; they also 
 failed to connect it with a personal, divine source, 
 
 2d 
 
402 Appendix [Lecture V 
 
 and hence had no ground of inspiration and no 
 sufficient motive to duty. In other phrase, they 
 were without the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. 
 Compare, for example, Abraham and Zeno; the 
 latter had an immeasurably wider culture and 
 range of thought, but he could not elaborate a 
 vital system. Abraham, on the contrary, with his 
 one idea of a spiritual, personal God, and his one 
 principle of obedient trust, inaugurated an order 
 that instantly became vital and endures still as 
 eternal truth. He did not look as widely, perhaps 
 not as directly, at life, as the Stoic, but he looked 
 in truer directions. No truth, unless it happens 
 to be an all-embracing truth, and no number of 
 truths, however clearly seen, have any inspiring or 
 redeeming power until they are grounded in an 
 eternal Person. Mozley, in one of his sermons, 
 asks, 'Have we not, in our moral nature, a great 
 deal to do with fragments?^ Yes, and it is the 
 weakness of human nature when it undertakes to 
 teach moral truth that it has only fragments to 
 deal with. It is because Christ did not see truth 
 in a fragmentary way, and because there was in 
 Himself nothing fragmentary, that He teaches with 
 power. There is no capability in man of resisting 
 perfect truth; when it is seen, it conquers. The 
 main thing, therefore, is to see, but men love dark- 
 ness, and even Avhen they begin to see, it is in a 
 half-blind way." — T. T. Muxc^er, The Freedom of 
 Faith (Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., New York, 1884), 
 pp. 163, 164. 
 
Lecture VI] Apj^endix 403 
 
 LECTUKE VI 
 
 Note 46. Page 213. —"Si Ton demandait a im 
 lecteur d'intelligence nioyenne, qui aurait lu les 
 dix-huit volumes de I'histoire naturelle et sociale 
 d'une famille sous le second Empire, ce qu'il i:)ense 
 de cette fameuse tlieorie de I'heredite, il serait cer- 
 tainement dans un grand embarras : 'J'ai vu, nous 
 dirait-il, une vingtaine de personages qui ne se 
 ressemblent en rien, entre lesquels on m'affirme 
 qu'il J a un fil commun que je n'apergois pas; dont 
 les uns sont honnetes, les autres interesses, celui-ci 
 criminel, celui-la ivrogne, par suite d'une meme 
 nevrose originelle. En somme, cette famille m'in- 
 teresse fort, parce qu'elle reproduit en diminutif 
 I'image du monde, infiniment diversifie ; mais je ne 
 parviens pas a me faire une idee a pen pres claire 
 de ce qu'elle est en tant que famille ; et je ne vois 
 pas beaucoup plus de rapports entre ses divers niem- 
 bres et les premiers Eougon-^Iacquart qu'on ni'a 
 presentes qu'entre vous, moi, quelques autres et nos 
 premiers parents, Adam et Eve.' Mais peut-etre 
 bien que si I'on poussait notre liomme a la reflexion, 
 on en tirerait autre chose; peut-etre que, en pro- 
 cedant selon la methode socratique, de question en 
 question, on I'amenerait a dire: ^Ah! je vois encore 
 ceci, par exemple ! C'est que tons ces gens sont ce 
 qu'ils sont de par une force etrangere, sur laquelle 
 ils ne peuvent rien, qui les gouverne et les dirige. 
 lis sont de simples marionnettes : je vois leurs 
 mouvements, et je sais que ces mouvements ne 
 
404 Appendix [Lecture VI 
 
 dependent pas d'eux, mais de la ficelle qui les agite 
 et de la main qui tient la ficelle. Et je n'aperqois 
 pas la ficelle, et je n'apercois pas la main. lis 
 ne sont pas libres, j'en suis sur; de quel tyran de- 
 pendent-ils ? Je n'en sais rien.' Et notre homme 
 aurait resume, au point de vue qui nous occupe, tout 
 ce qu'on peat dire de I'oeuvre de M. Zola : elle n'est 
 pas scientifique et ne nous apporte aucun renseigne- 
 ment sur la doctrine de I'heredite; mais elle est 
 litteraire et fait penetrer en nous les consequences 
 de cette doctrine, qui sont la negation radicale de la 
 liberte et de la responsabilite humaine. En sorte 
 que M. Zola a detruit des croyances positives qui 
 n'etaient peut-etre que des prejuges, mais n'a au- 
 cunement justifie, ni explique, ni prouve les croy- 
 ances negatives qu'il s'applique a leur substituer. 
 Le christianisme qu'il repousse, et la science qu'il 
 prend pour religion ont entre eux ce point de res- 
 semblance, que leur base est egalement incertaine, 
 en dehors de I'observation. Pour croire a I'heredite 
 de la famille Rougon-Macquart, il faudrait un acte 
 de foi pour le moins egal a celui qu'exigent les 
 dogmes de la Trinite on de I'lmmaculee-Concep- 
 tion; et, apres I'avoir accompli, on serait peut-etre 
 moins avance," — Edouard Eod, Idees Morales du 
 Temps Present, pp. 80-82. 
 
 Note 47. Page 214. — "Heredity is liis hobby- 
 horse, which he mounts in every one of his pieces. 
 There is not a single trait in his personages, a 
 single peculiarity of character, a single disease, that 
 he does not trace to heredity. In A DolVs House, 
 
Lecture VI] Alipendix 405 
 
 Dr. Rank's 'poor innocent spine must do penance 
 for "liis" father's notions of amusement when he 
 was a lieutenant in the army.' . . . Helmer ex- 
 plains to Nora that 'a misty atmosphere of lying 
 brings contagion into the whole family. Every 
 breath the children draw contains some germ of 
 evil. Nearly all men who go to ruin early have had 
 untruthful mothers. ... In most cases it comes 
 from the mother ; but the father naturally works in 
 the same direction. ' And again : 'Your father's low 
 principles you have inherited, every one of them. 
 No religion, no morality, no sense of duty.' In 
 Ghosts, Oswald has learned from the extraordinary 
 doctor in Paris who told him he had softening of 
 the brain, that he had inherited his malady from 
 his father. Regina, the natural daughter of the 
 late Alving, exactly resembles her mother. . . . 
 
 '^ In HosinersJiolm, Rebecca's nymphomania is ex- 
 plained by the fact that she is the natural daughter 
 of a Lapland woman of doubtful morals. 'I believe 
 your whole conduct is determined by your origin, ' 
 Rector Kroll says to her. Rosmer never laughs, 
 because 'it is a trait of his family.' He is 'the 
 descendant of the men that look down on us from 
 these walls.' His 'spirit is deeply rooted in his 
 ancestry.' Hilda, the step-daughter of the 'Lady 
 from the Sea' says: 'I should not wonder if some 
 fine day she went mad. . . . Her mother went 
 mad, too. She died mad. I know that.' In The 
 Wild Duck nearly every one has a hereditary mark. 
 Gregers Werle, the malignant imbecile, wlio liolds 
 and proclaims his passion for gossip as an ardent 
 
406 Appendix [Lecture VI 
 
 desire for trutli, inherits this craze from his mother. 
 Little Hedwig becomes blind, like her father, old 
 Werle. 
 
 "In the earlier philosophical dramas the same 
 idea is constantly repeated. Brand gets his obsti- 
 nacy, and Peer Gynt his lively, extravagant imagi- 
 nation, from the mother. Ibsen has evidently read 
 Lucas's book on the first principles of heredity, 
 and has borrowed from it uncritically. It is true 
 that Lucas believes in the inheritance even of 
 notions and feelings as complex and as nearly 
 related to specific facts as, e.g., the horror of doc- 
 tors, and that he does not doubt the transmission 
 of diseased deviations from the norm, e.g., the 
 appearance of blindness at a definite age. Lucas, 
 however, whose merits are not to be denied, did 
 not sufficiently distinguish between that which the 
 individual receives in its material genesis from its 
 parents, and that which is subsequently suggested 
 by family life and example, by continuous exist- 
 ence in the same conditions as its parents, etc. 
 Ibsen is the true 'man of one book.' He abides 
 by his Lucas." — Max Nokdau, Degeneration, pp. 
 350-352. 
 
 Note 48. Page 215. — " It has come about that 
 the novels and stories which are to fill our leisure 
 hours and cheer us in this vale of tears have be- 
 come what we call tragic. It is not easy to define 
 what tragedy is, but the term is applied in modern 
 fiction to scenes and characters that come to ruin from 
 no particular fault of their own, — not even when 
 
Lecture VI] Appendix 407 
 
 the characters break most of the Ten Command- 
 ments, — but by an unappeasable fate that dogs and 
 thwarts them. Ugliness and suffering and misfort- 
 une unrelieved make a modern tragedy, and there 
 has come an opinion that tragedy of this sort is the 
 highest type of literature. . . . This situation has 
 much of the tragic in it. It is nothing else than 
 tragic to see a rosy-cheeked or spectacled young 
 woman whose life has been mainly guarded from 
 evil and surrounded by the sunshine of family and 
 social affection, or a young man of considerable 
 culture and considerable promise^ whose enjoyment 
 of life is scarcely at all abated by cigarettes and a 
 sceptical philosophy, sit down with an inkstand and 
 a steel pen, and on white paper sketch the blackness 
 of life, the misery of humanity, the wretchedness of 
 a world of damnable complications, of which neither 
 of them can have had more than the slightest expe- 
 rience. . . . But the young only follow more ex- 
 perienced and skilful leaders in this — leaders who 
 are supposed in their melodramatic tales to touch 
 the height of ancient and dignified tragedy in 
 literature. These writers bring together a half- 
 dozen human beings of feeble will and strong pas- 
 sions, ignorant, or half-educated, or oestlietically 
 educated, who have an assortment of good and bad 
 qualities, who cannot tell a lie, but who can break 
 any marriage tie they have sworn to, who can 
 murder in a lielpless sort of way, who break all 
 the social conventions of decency but have convic- 
 tions of their own about morality, who violate all 
 the laws of thrift and order and of conduct ex- 
 
408 Appendix [Lecture VI 
 
 pressed by Moses or by the state, and pass their 
 lives in misery, and are defeated in every transient 
 aspiration for a better life, and come altogether to 
 a pitiful and squalid end. And for this misery 
 and this end they are in no wise to blame. They 
 could not help themselves, poor things; they do 
 not know that in half the cases it was the novelist 
 who would not let them help themselves, but kept 
 them grinding along in his circle of cruel complica- 
 tions. . . . This is the romance of fatality, and if 
 it is tragedy, it is the tragedy of fatalism. 
 
 " If we are permitted to turn to what used to be 
 called in literature tragedy, we find that the Greek 
 dramatists have another conception of it. In the 
 dramas of ^schylus we see the impassioned pres- 
 entation of humanity in action, and humanity in 
 action on the basis of the poet's ethical conception 
 of the divine government of the world. Not a 
 mechanical fate, but a providential Nemesis, had 
 been the lesson of Homer and the lyric poets ; and 
 this was the ruling motive of Greek tragedy, — the 
 sense of a righteous power, the Hebraic idea of an 
 offended holiness punishing pride and vice to the 
 children's children, but showing mercy to the peni- 
 tent. It set forth the moral law, and the tragedy 
 flowed from its disobedience. This had the faint- 
 est relation to the Fatality of the Orient and of the 
 modern novelist." — Charles Dudley Warner, 
 Harper's Magazine, March, 1896, "Fatalism in 
 Modern Fiction." 
 
Lecture VI] Appendix 409 
 
 Note 49. Page 216. — "There is, however 
 
 an- 
 
 other series of speculations, which has probably 
 contributed as much as anything to modern pes- 
 simism. If the State Socialist is trying to com- 
 press impulse and will in political society, the 
 physiologist is fighting the old battle against free 
 will in the individual, with what seems for the 
 moment asbolute success. In a sense, of course, 
 we did not need Mr. Galton and his compeers on 
 the Continent to teach us the doctrine of heredity. 
 Its main facts have never been overlooked, and 
 modern science might take for its epigraph, ' The 
 fathers have eaten sour grapes and the children's 
 teeth are set on edge.' Still, there is the greatest 
 possible difference between a wise man's aphorism, 
 the precise value of which is not easily calculable, 
 and a scientific demonstration, which shows the 
 whole region occupied by a particular law. Fifty 
 years ago a man's chance of extricating himself 
 from family failings seemed an extremely fair 
 one. The mother's influence might counteract the 
 father's; and the man whose parents were of 
 dubious worth might hark back to an older and 
 better stock; or the influences of education might 
 neutralize the inherited evil quality. All these 
 considerations remain as true as they were, but we 
 see more clearly than we did that everything which 
 has once been in the race endures as a permanent 
 influence modifying it, and that family types are 
 apt to remain scarcely alterable for generations. 
 Even if a particular man can flatter himself with 
 reason that he has escaped or conquered a vicious 
 
410 Appendix [Lecture VI 
 
 tendency, he knows that he isjdoqmed to see it 
 reappear in his chiklren. Now, the fatalism of 
 science in this direction seems of a more hopeless 
 kind than the old theological doctrine of predestina- 
 tion to life eternal or death eternal. In Calvinism 
 the doomed man does not know his fate. Occasion- 
 ally he fancies he does, and is overpowered by the 
 horror of the situation, but, as a rule, he acts on 
 the assumption that he may be one of the elect. 
 On tlie other hand, every man knows that the furies 
 of past generations are behind him; and that he is 
 bound to inherit the passions and the impotencies 
 as well as the nobler qualities of his ancestral line. 
 In Calvinism the man's life upon earth is not neces- 
 sarily affected. He may be a very excellent man 
 to current acceptation. Besides the ordinary obli- 
 gation to live well which he recognizes, he is deeply 
 interested in his own success, as his works are a 
 slight indication that he may have been called. 
 The modern thinker, however, who has taken up 
 the teaching of heredity as a faith, may easily 
 come to look upon himself as nothing more than a 
 compound of experiences. He is visited at every 
 critical moment by the doubt whether it is really 
 possible for him to escape^ from the character tliat 
 lie inherits as he inherits physical t^qie. " — Charles 
 H. Pearson, Fortnightly Review, "The Causes of 
 Pessimism." 
 
 Note 50. Page 216. — " The 'religion of human- 
 ity ' runs back the genealogy of man, with all his 
 powers, with all his equipments, to the dust of 
 
Lecture VI] Appendix 411 
 
 the earth. I hold in my hand a genealogy which 
 T wish you to compare with the genealogy of Luke. 
 It is not a satire, it is not an irony. I have taken 
 it from the pages of Ernest Haeckel. It is true, I 
 have condensed it from perhaps a dozen pages, but 
 in that condensation I have followed precisely the 
 line traced by the atheistic pliilosopher. What is 
 omitted is simply tlie detailed description of the 
 several species in the genealogy. Let me read it : 
 "'Monera begat Amoeb?e, Amoebae begat Syn- 
 amoebse, Synamoebee begat Ciliated Larva, Ciliated 
 Larva begat Primeval Stomach Animals, Primeval 
 Stomach Animals begat Gliding AVorms, Gliding 
 Worms begat Soft Worms, Soft Worms begat Sack 
 AVorms, Sack Worms begat Skull-less Animals, 
 Skull-less Animals begat Single-nostrilled Animals, 
 Single-nostrilled Animals begat Primeval Fish, 
 Primeval Fish begat Mud Fish, Mud Fish begat 
 Gilled Amphibians, Gilled Amphibians begat Tailed 
 Amphibians, Tailed Amphibians begat Primeval 
 Amniota, Primeval Amniota begat Primary Mam- 
 mals, Primary Mammals begat Pouched Animals, 
 Pouched Animals begat Semi-apes, Semi-apes begat 
 Tailed Apes, Tailed Apes begat Man-like Apes, 
 Man-like Apes begat Ape-like Men, Ape-like Men 
 begat Men.' " — Lvmax Aubott, Christian Thourjht, 
 1887, Article on "The Pveligion of Humanity." 
 
 Note 51. Page 223. —"Men do actually antag- 
 onize and overcome their vital inheritance, d(^fy 
 their environment, and, without dependence u})on 
 either, choose to live as if they were the chihlreu 
 
412 Ajjpendix [Lecture VI 
 
 of a virtuous ancestry and subject only to refined 
 conditions. These truths are apparently contra- 
 dictory, and yet one is as evident as the other. 
 Two boys are the children of drunken parents; 
 their home is one room of a tenement in which a 
 dozen other persons eat and sleep; their school is 
 the street. All that bad blood and evil conditions 
 can do for them is done. Some day the elder in a 
 fit of drunken fury strikes a murderous blow. He 
 is arrested, arraigned, tried, condemned, executed; 
 he alone, though at the bar of God he has many 
 accomplices. Equally, and possibly still more, 
 culpable are the society which makes it possible 
 for sucli degraded creatures to be born; the State, 
 which allows saloons on every corner, and permits 
 such wretched tenements as the childhood home 
 of these boys; and the men who own those build- 
 ings, anxious rather for rent than for the welfare 
 of human beings. The other boy, however, son of 
 the same drunken parents and brought up amidst 
 the same vileness, is no longer there. His evil 
 heritage has been overcome, and his circumstances 
 changed; he is a gentleman of wealth, of culture, 
 of real and unaffected goodness. What has made 
 the difference? Not society, for the surroundings 
 of the lads were alike bad. The younger may have 
 received from his ancestry certain good tendencies 
 that his brother did not; but so far as can be traced 
 the legacy has been the same. What shall we think 
 about this remarkable and impressive contrast? I 
 know no answer except this: in every man there is 
 an untainted power^ something which passes from 
 
Lecture VI] Appendix 413 
 
 generation to generation untouched by change, and 
 tliat in this ultimate essence of personality rests 
 the power of choice, whicli may be shut in by evil 
 conditions and tied to a thousand evil tendencies, 
 but which is in its nature free, and is rarely, if 
 ever, entirely denied expression. At least it may 
 be said that no fact in the physical series militates 
 against the doctrine of human freedom which may 
 not immediately be met and fully balanced by a 
 fact in the spiritual series." — Amoky H. Brad- 
 ford, Heredity and Christian Problems, p}). 81), 90. 
 
 Note 52. Page 226. — "Under these circum- 
 stances, one can leave the question open whilst wait- 
 ing for light, or one can do what most speculative 
 minds do, that is, look to one's general philosoi)hy 
 to incline the beam. The believers in mechanism 
 do so without hesitation, and they ought not to 
 refuse a similar privilege to the believers in a spir- 
 itual force. I count myself among the latter, but 
 as my reasons are ethical they are hardly suited for 
 introduction into a psychological work. The last 
 word of psychology here is ignorance, for the 
 •forces ' engaged are certainly too delicate and nu- 
 merous to be followed in detail. Meanwhile, in 
 view of the strange arrogance with Avhich the wihl- 
 est materialistic speculations persist in calling 
 themselves 'science,' it is well to recall just what 
 the reasoning is, by which the effect-theory of atten- 
 tion is confirmed. It is an argument from analogy, 
 drawn from rivers, reflex actions, and other mate- 
 rial phenomena where no consciousness appears to 
 
41^1: Appendix [Lecture VI 
 
 exist at all, and extended to cases where conscious- 
 ness seems the phenomenon's essential feature. The 
 consciousness doesn't count, these reasoners say; it 
 doesn't exist for science, it is nil; you mustn't 
 think about it at all. The intensely reckless char- 
 acter of all tliis needs no comment. It is making 
 the mechanical theory true per fas ant nefas. For 
 the sake of that theory we make inductions from 
 phenomena to others that are startlingly tinlikQ 
 them; and we assume that a complication which 
 Nature has introduced (the presence of feeling and 
 of effort, namely) is not worthy of scientific recog- 
 nition at all. Such conduct may conceivably be 
 loise, though I doubt it; but scientific, as con- 
 trasted with metapliysical, it cannot seriously be 
 called." — William James, Psjjcholog]/ (^ew York, 
 Henry Holt & Co.), Vol. I., p. 454. ' 
 
 '' The most that any argument can do for deter- 
 minism is to make it a clear and seductive concep- 
 tion, which a man is foolish not to espouse, so long 
 as he stands by the great scientific postulate that 
 the world must be one unbroken fact, and that 
 prediction of all things without exception must 
 be ideally, even if not actually, possible. It is a 
 moral postulate about the Universe, the postulate 
 that ivhat ought to be can he, and that had acts can- 
 not he fated, h\it that good ones must he possihle in 
 their place, which would lead one to espouse the 
 contrary view. But when scientific and moral pos- 
 tulates war thus with each other and objective proof 
 is not to be had, the only course is voluntary choice. 
 
Lecture VI] Appendix 415 
 
 for scepticism itself, if systematic, is also volun- 
 tary choice. If, meanwhile, the will he determined, 
 it would seem only fitting that the belief in its 
 determination should be voluntarily chosen from 
 amongst other possible beliefs. Freedom's first 
 deed should be to affirm itself. We ought never 
 to hope for any other method of getting at the 
 truth if in determinism be a fact. Doubt of this 
 particular truth will, therefore, probably be open 
 to us to the end of time, and the utmost that a 
 believer in free-will can ever do will be to show 
 tliat the deterministic arguments are not coercive. 
 That they are seductive, I am the last to deny; 
 nor do I deny that effort may be needed to keep the 
 faith in freedom, when they press upon it, upright 
 in the mind." — 76?d., Vol. II., pp. 573 ff. 
 
 Note 53. Page 227. — " First, the humiliation of 
 our Lord, including His Incarnation, is represented 
 as a continuously voluntary act. His determina- 
 tion to become incarnate, and tlie act of becoming 
 so, are certainly represented as voluntary. Its 
 whole moral value is described as consisting in the 
 freeness with which it was done. It thus became 
 the act of self-sacrifice and self-humiliation that 
 it was. 'He who was rich became poor.' 'He 
 thought not equality with God a matter for grasp- 
 ing, but made Himself of no account, and took the 
 form of a servant.' Tlie point, however, to wliicli 
 I call attention is that, after the act of incarnation 
 had been accomplished, the incarnate life of humili- 
 ation on earth is represented as still a continuous 
 
416 Appendix [Lecture VI 
 
 act of voluntary lowliness. Thus, in Pliilippians, 
 He not only took the form of a servant and became 
 in the likeness of men, but, being found in fashion 
 as a man. He humbled Himself and became obedient 
 unto death. His subjugation to law is here de- 
 scribed as a continuously voluntary act and as the 
 continuation of the same purpose and personal 
 determination by which He became man. So in 
 the Epistle to the Hebrews we read: 'Forasmuch 
 as the children are partakers of flesh and blood. 
 Himself also in like manner [TrapaTrAT/o-t'cos, " in every 
 respect"] partook of the same.' Both the act of 
 incarnation and all His experimental identity with 
 man were parts of one plan of voluntary self- 
 humiliation." — Rev. George T. Pukves, The 
 Incarnation Biblically Considered, p. 78. 
 
 Note 54. Page 234. — "The whole of Jesus' 
 preaching of the kingdom of heaven is a procla- 
 mation of grace, a doctrine of salvation, and it is 
 united with the doctrine of righteousness in the 
 manner of the Augustinian ^ Doniine, da quod jubes, 
 etjabe quod vis.' Not as though Jesus had deprived 
 man of moral freedom. On the contrary, — and the 
 ethical conception of his doctrine just rejected is 
 quite right in this, — the presupposition that man 
 is incapable of doing the will of God on account of 
 sin is unknown to Jesus. He demands of men 
 throughout the doing of His commandments, the 
 doing of the divine will. He credits them through- 
 out with the power to repent, that is, to change 
 their iiiind, and become of that mind, in virtue of 
 
Lecture VII] Appendix 417 
 
 wliicli one can only truly do the commandments of 
 God in detail. And He not only credits tliem with 
 this freedom, on the authority of His Word and 
 Gospel, but also on the authority of the words of 
 the Old Testament, the law, and the prophets. It 
 is by no means meant ironically when He directs 
 the scribes to the two great commandments (Luke 
 X. 23 f.), 'Do this, and you will live '; or the rich 
 young man (Matt. xix. 17), 'If thou wilt enter 
 into life, keep the commandments.' It is said of 
 the brethren of the rich man (Luke xiv. 29), 'They 
 have Moses and the prophets, let them hear them ' 
 (viz. in the interest of their own conversion). The 
 poor Lazarus, in the same parable, has heard Moses 
 and the prophets, and in their school has developed 
 an inner life which could bear him at death on 
 angels' wings into paradise; and Abraham, the 
 patriarchs, the j)rophets, according to Luke xvi. 
 22, Matt. viii. 12, have arrived there." — Bf.y- 
 scHLAG, New Testament Theology, Vol. I., pp. 131, 
 132. 
 
 LECTURE VII 
 
 Note 55. Page 257. — "This new conception of 
 God, as immanent in nature, is necessarily accom- 
 panied by a new conception of law and miracles. 
 Eather, we are going back to the iN'ew Testament 
 conception and definition of miracles. They are 
 no longer regarded as violations of natural law, or 
 even as suspensions of natural law. Indeed, in 
 strictness of speech, in the view of this philoso- 
 pliy, there are no natural laws to be violated or 
 
 2e 
 
418 Appendix [Lecture VII 
 
 suspended. There is only one Force, that is God; 
 law is but the habit of God's action; miracles are 
 but the manifestation of His power and presence in 
 unexpected actions, demonstrating the existence of 
 an intelligent Will and Power superior to that of 
 man. I say that this is a recurrence to the New 
 Testament conception and definition of miracles; 
 for the writers of the New Testament knew noth- 
 ing about nature and the supernatural, nothing 
 about natural causes and the violation or suspen- 
 sion of natural laws. The words they used to 
 characterize what we call miracles indicate their 
 apprehension of these events. Four words were 
 used by them: 'wonders,' 'powers,' 'works,' and 
 'signs' or 'miracles.' Any event attracting atten- 
 tion and compelling ivonder, exhibiting unusual 
 or more than human poiver, accomplishing a real 
 wo7^Jc, usually beneficent, and serving as the sign of 
 a special messenger and an authentication of his 
 message, is in the conception of the writers of the 
 New Testament a miracle. As the New Theology 
 believes that 'all power belongs to God,' that God 
 is immanent in the universe, and that there is no 
 real distinction between the natural and the super- 
 natural, that the only dualism is the material or 
 physical and the immaterial or spiritual, it has no 
 difficulty in believing that the control of the physi- 
 cal by the spiritual, and therefore of the universe 
 by its God, is sometimes manifested by unexpected 
 or unusual acts of power and wisdom for spiritual 
 ends. These are miracles." — 'Lyman Abbott, 
 The Evolution of Christianity, pp. 112, 113. 
 
Lecture VII] Appendix 419 
 
 "It is not of course that there is any spiritual 
 parsimony in God, but that it is only through the 
 comparative rarity of the gleams of light, through 
 their contrast to common experience, that tliey 
 teach us the true lesson of that common experi- 
 ence. If they were much more frequent,' — we 
 being what we are, — we should lose the meaning 
 of the lesson through that f requeue}^; just as in 
 countries where life is excessively precarious, 
 death does not enhance half so much as in other 
 countries the value of life. In a land where every 
 one was original, originality would lose its power, 
 and perhaps become a great danger; its value being 
 to explain the limitations of ordinary habit, not to 
 dissolve ordinary habit. So spiritual influence is 
 the divine comment on ordinary human w^ants and 
 desires, and miracle the divine comment on law — 
 neither of which would have the same value, if the 
 subject of the comment were not worked into the 
 very substance of our minds before the comment 
 came. Miracle teaches the divine meaning of per- 
 manent law ; and owes all its impressiveness to the 
 comparative fixity and permanence of the phenom- 
 ena which it interrupts. Miracle forces upon us 
 personality, but would not force it upon us unless 
 it were so exceptional in its mode of occurrence as 
 to open a new mental relation between us and the 
 Author of Nature. It is a mistake to take the uni- 
 formity of the laws of Nature as the measure of 
 God's purposes, just as it is a mistake to take the 
 every-day habits even of a human being as the 
 measure of his aims. You cannot tell what they 
 
420 Appendix [Lecture VII 
 
 really mean — they are too wide for interpretation 
 — till you get some light on them from the occa- 
 sions on which the man himself breaks through 
 them, and you see the reasons he assigns for doing 
 so. And so Avith the laws of Nature — they are far 
 too big for moral interpretation, too vast for our 
 survey, till at some one point we see the reason 
 why they are modified, and, then, that first really 
 tells us the reason why they Avere ever fixed. It 
 is not that miracle is half as Avide as Nature; on 
 the contrary, it is just because it is so much nar- 
 roAver, that it lets the gleam of the personal Spirit 
 shine through it, and so throws a light on the 
 Avhole structure." — E,. H. Huttox, Conte7n]porary 
 Thought and Thinkers, Vol. II., i^p. 119, 120. 
 
 Note 56. Page 258. — " They Avere talking about 
 miracles, and the young Doctor said: 'You knoAV 
 as well as I do, Stephen, that everything in this 
 world moves in regular order. The laAvs of nature 
 are Avhat Ave all have to depend on, and they never 
 change. It's certain that if you plant potatoes 
 they Avon't come up pumpkins. Neither you nor 
 any man here ever saw a miracle. You never 
 heard of one in your life in these parts. You 
 never heard of pumpkin vines groAving from pota- 
 toes. It stands to reason and common sense that 
 Avhen no man in this toAvn ever saw anything hap- 
 pen that Avasn't in the regular course of natural 
 laAV, anything supernatural, it isn't likely such 
 things are going to happen here.' 
 
 "I looked at Stephen, as the Doctor called him. 
 
Lecture VII] Appendix 421 
 
 He was an elderly man, hard-featured and sun- 
 burned. There was a shrewd twinkle in his eye, 
 but he looked at the stove and not at the Doctor, 
 and there was a silence for a moment wliile he 
 pondered. Then he spoke in a mild, inquiring sort 
 of way, which contrasted with the Doctor's some- 
 what self-opinionated tone. 
 
 " ' I don't know much about the laws of natur', 
 but I suppose you mean something like this — that 
 when I let go that jack-knife it'll fall on the floor; ' 
 and he stretched out a long arm holding an open 
 knife by the blade between his thumb and linger. 
 
 "'Exactly,' said the Doctor; 'that's the law of 
 gravitation. ' 
 
 "'And it's sure to fall, and I can bet my money 
 on it, and I needn't be afraid of a miracle? Look 
 here. Doctor, where did the law that binds it to 
 fall come from? What made that particular law?' 
 
 "The Doctor was honest; that was evident from 
 his reply. 'The learned men who have investi- 
 gated the laws of nature have not found the origin 
 of the laws. They will in time. It's only in 
 recent years that science has made its great dis- 
 coveries in the laws themselves. Heat, light, 
 colour, electricity, all the great characteristics of 
 the changing world and of matter itself, have 
 never been understood as they are now.' 
 
 "'And you can't tell me what made the law that 
 binds that jack-knife to fall down? ' 
 
 "'No, I can't. It's enough to know as certain 
 that it will fall. Just let go, and you'll see the 
 certainty. ' 
 
422 Appendix [Lecture VII 
 
 ^^'No chance of anything supernat'ral; any 
 miracle? ' 
 
 "'Miracle be hanged. Let go the blade.' 
 "Stephen's thumb and finger separated and stood 
 stretched out wide apart. The jack-knife was not 
 on the floor. It was hanging to the wooden ceiling 
 overhead, its blade buried a half-inch in the soft 
 pine. For about ten seconds no one spoke. Ste- 
 phen was looking at the Doctor. 
 
 "'Suthin' supernat'ral happened, didn't it?' said 
 Stephen. 
 
 " 'You jerked the knife up yourself.' 
 "'Well, that warn't nat'ral, war it?' 
 " The Doctor hesitated. 'Now see here, Doctor,' 
 said the old man, 'just tell me how old is your law 
 that the jack-knife's got to fall down.' 
 
 '"Millions of years old. Just as old as there 
 has been anything to fall.' 
 
 "'And how old was the law that said that jack- 
 knife must go up there and stick its blade in that 
 white-pine ceiling? Just three minutes and a half 
 old by the clock. Now what I want to know is 
 where did your law that it must go down come 
 from. You say you don't know. Well, it stands 
 to sense, then, and you can't deny that it may 
 come from some one that makes it go down just as 
 I made it go up. If your science is worth a sneeze, 
 it oughtn't to deny what it don't know nothing 
 about. And if that's so, it's always just as like as 
 not whoever made the thing go down will make it 
 go up, without you or I or an}^ one else knowing 
 what made it go^ any more than you know what 
 
Lecture VII] Appendix 423 
 
 made me jerk that knife up yonder. You tell me 
 that if I plant potatoes they won't come up 
 squashes, but you just tell me what plants pota- 
 toes, or what makes me plant 'em, anyhow. If I 
 don't plant 'em, there ain't going to be any pota- 
 toes nor squashes. It's according to reason that 
 if potatoes come up because I planted potatoes, 
 squashes don't come up from them, because some 
 one else takes care of that part of the business. I 
 don't believe in your argiments that laws always 
 may be depended on, when you tell me yourself 
 that you don't know where the laws come from 
 and how long they're goin' to last. Your science 
 is all right, Doctor, just as long as it talks about 
 what it knows about. But when your science says 
 a knife's bound to fall down, and don't take into 
 account that something supernat'ral may interfere 
 that science don't know nothing about, sich as my 
 sudden making up my mind to jerk it up, why your 
 science ain't wuth any more than a last year's 
 almanac to tell a fellow what the weather's goin' 
 to be.' 
 
 "By this time Stephen's tone and style had 
 changed. He was no longer humble and inquir- 
 ing, but decidedly aggressive. There were some 
 strong words, not exactly profane, adjectively ap- 
 plied to science in the last sentence, which I have 
 omitted. He talked rapidly and vehemently and 
 with pointed logic. Is logic one of the distin- 
 guishing characteristics of humanity? There are 
 men, exceptions, sometimes men of eminence, who 
 do not seem to have any idea of logic, but by the 
 
424 Appendix [Lecture VII 
 
 vast majority of men, however imeclucated, logical 
 sequence seems instinctively appreciated, and the 
 most illiterate are very sure to detect failure in 
 argument. 
 
 ''As he talked he rose and stood up, six feet 
 two, — a mighty frame, lit for tremendous work, — 
 and lie poured out a storm of plain and unanswer- 
 able philosophic truth, ending up in this wise: 
 'No miracles, but only jest steady laws? Well, 
 accordin' to law that jack-knife will stick there 
 till the wood rots or the steel rusts. Make your 
 prophecy if you dare. Say what it'll do. Is there 
 any law that'll tell you what' 11 come of it? or 
 whether Sam or Timmy won't have it down and 
 pocket it as soon as I'm gone? You don't know? 
 Well, I do. There's just such a law, and I made 
 it; ' aud so saying he reached up his long arm, 
 seized the knife, and strode out of the door, growl- 
 ing as he went." — W. C. Pkime, Along New Eng- 
 land Roads (New York, Harpers, 1S92), "A 
 Village Discussion," pp. 35-39. 
 
 Note 57. Page 266. — " It is objected to the be- 
 lief that God is personal, that personality implies 
 limitation, and that, if personal, God could not 
 be infinite and absolute. 'Infinite' (and the same 
 is true of 'absolute') is an adjective, not a sub- 
 stantive. When used as a noun, preceded by 
 the definite article, it signifies, not a being, but 
 an abstraction. AVhen it stands as a predicate, it 
 means that the subject, be it space, time, or some 
 quality of a being, is without limit. Thus, when I 
 
Lecture VII] Appendix 425 
 
 affirm that space is infinite, I express a positive 
 perception, or thought. I mean not only that im- 
 agination can set no bounds to space, but also that 
 this inability is owing, not to any defect in the 
 imagination or conceptive faculty, but to the nat- 
 ure of the object. When I say that God is infinite 
 in power, I mean that lie can do all things which 
 are objects of power, or that His power is inca- 
 pable of increase. No amount of power can be 
 added to the power of which He is possessed. It 
 is only when the 'Infinite' is taken as the syno- 
 nyme of the sum of all existence, that personality 
 is made to be incompatible with Grod's infinitude. 
 No such conception of Him is needed for the satis- 
 faction of the reason or the heart of man. Enough 
 that He is the ground of the existence of all beings 
 outside of Himself, or the creative and sustaining 
 power. There are no limitations upon His power 
 which He has not voluntarily set. Such limitation 
 — as in giving being to rational agents capable of 
 self-determination, and in allowing them scope for 
 its exercise — is not imposed on Him, but depends 
 on His own choice." — ^ George P. Fisher, The 
 Grounds of Theistic and Christian Belief (New 
 York, Scribners, 1883), pp. 69, 70. 
 
 "A physical law has nothing wherewith to resist 
 God, wdio can as easily make or do a thing in an- 
 other way than that of law, as by that law. A 
 physical law is as nothing, regarding it as j)re- 
 venting God from acting in any special way. If 
 this law acts, it acts; but if it does not act, some 
 
426 Appendix [Lecture VII 
 
 otlier mode does for the occasion. But it is a dif- 
 ferent tiling when we come to the actual wills of 
 real beings. The will of man is admitted (with 
 that reserve which, as ignorant creatures, we must 
 fall back upon in such mysterious statements), as 
 that which has the power of resisting the will of 
 God. Free-will is claimed as a real attribute of 
 man — power to do or not to do. The will can 
 resist God's will, and can stop the progress of a 
 work of God. Is this an intricate view of Divine 
 dealings, and does putting Divine power under such 
 checks and conditions as a progressive revelation 
 implies seem radically to interfere with the attri- 
 bute? This is an objection which, if it be of any 
 force at all, does not apply to a progressive revela- 
 tion specially; it applies to the whole idea of a 
 Deity, as compatible with Iwww^w free-io ill. Human 
 free-will is an internal modification of the idea of 
 God, which is only prevented from interfering 
 injuriously with the idea, by the intervention of 
 our resort to ignorance. As ignorant creatures we 
 are not entitled to say that apparent limitations of 
 the Divine power are real ones, because they may 
 be only such as the mathematical consistency of 
 truth itself imposes; that is, only verbal restric- 
 tions upon power, and not real ones. To the intel- 
 lectual conception, however, the idea of God is thus 
 an idea with checks and conditions in it; and those 
 Avho would simplify it absolutely, would establish 
 an idol and not a God. If we invent an idol, all 
 is plain enough; there are no enigmas in an idol; 
 there are no reasons why individuals cannot be 
 
LECTURE VII] Apijendix 427 
 
 converted in an instant, and why the hnman race 
 cannot be enlightened in an instant by an abstract 
 Omnipotence. But if we suppose the Deity to be 
 the Being we represent Him in our sermons, our 
 popular treatises, our exhortations, who cannot do 
 some things, and cannot change man without his 
 own concurrence, this is a Deity who cannot give 
 enlightenment or implant a revelation in man by 
 an instantaneous act," — J. B. Mozley, Ruling 
 Ideas in Early Ages (London, Eivingtons, 1889), 
 pp. 249, 250. 
 
 Note 58. Page 268. — " And tliis respect of God 
 for His creatures is seen most of all in His relation 
 to man. He never indeed allows human freedom 
 to disturb the main course of the world's develop- 
 ment; to tolerate that would be to abandon the 
 providential government of the world. But within 
 such an area as allows man to exercise a real, 
 though limited, freedom — to such a degree as at 
 least may involve considerable disturbance in the 
 divine order for the sake of the value of free, as 
 distinct from mechanical, service — God stands 
 aloof and respects that free nature which He has 
 created, that image of His own freedom which He 
 has, as it were, planted out in the heart of the 
 physical creation. God respects His creature man. 
 His power refrains itself. But is there, in order 
 to leave room for man's freedom of choice, a limi- 
 tation, not only of God's power, but of His fore- 
 knowledge? Is the old controversy as regards 
 human freedom and divine foreknowledge to be 
 
428 Appendix [Lecture VII 
 
 solved in part by the suggestion tliat a limitation 
 of divine foreknowing accompanies the very act of 
 creating free agents? The idea has commended 
 itself to some very thoughtful minds : to Origen, 
 as has already incidently appeared in this discus- 
 sion, and to Dr. Martineau in modern times. The 
 accurate examination of the meaning assigned to 
 divine 'foreknowledge ' in the Bible tends to shake 
 the traditional belief that God is there revealed as 
 knowing absolutely beforehand how each individual 
 will act. Nevertheless, it is at least as difficult to 
 reject this belief as to admit it. But, whatever be 
 our relation to it, at least we must admit that the 
 method of God in history, like the method of God 
 in nature, is to an astonishing degree self -restrain- 
 ing, gradual, we are almost driven to say, tenta- 
 tive. And all this line of thought — all this way 
 of conceiving of God's self-restraining power and 
 wisdom — at least prepares our mind for that 
 supreme act of respect and love for His creatures 
 by which the Son of God took into Himself human 
 nature to redeem it, and in taking it limited both 
 His power and His knowledge so that He could 
 verily live through all the stages of a perfectly 
 human experience and restore our nature from 
 witliin by a contact so gentle that it gave life to 
 every faculty without paralyzing or destroying 
 any." — Charles Gore, Dissertations (Xew York, 
 Scribners, 1895), pp. 223, 224. 
 
 Note 59. Page 270. — " We must distinguish 
 between tlie intelligence of Deity and His intellect- 
 
Lecture VII] Appendix 429 
 
 uality. His intellectuality, His capacity to know, 
 is perfect, without any deficiency or weakness; it 
 is an element of His necessary existence, and, 
 therefore, is wholly subjective. But His intelli- 
 gence is the knowing, and is the result of the 
 exercise of His intellectuality. Intelligence is 
 derived from intuition, from consciousness, from 
 inference, and from observation. Intelligence 
 derived from intuition and necessary conscious- 
 ness can never be increased or decreased. Intelli- 
 gence derived from inference and observation must 
 be derived from objectivity, but objectivity is the 
 realm of the contingent. Intelligence of the con- 
 tingent can never exist until the contingencies 
 exist, because a nonentity can have no objectivity. 
 That which is a present conceivable nonentity may 
 become an actual entity. But the apprehension 
 of a possible entity is theory, but not knowledge. 
 We must distinguish between the intelligence of 
 entities and the apprehension of possibles, between 
 God's consciousness of necessary existences, and 
 His intelligence derived from His inference and 
 from His observation of unnecessitated things. 
 
 " Failing to make this discrimination, men infer 
 that God's intelligence of contingencies is just as 
 immutable as His intelligence of necessities. In 
 the realm of necessities all God's thoughts are 
 immutable from everlasting to everlasting; but in 
 the realm of contingencies He can at pleasure will 
 worlds into existence. If He will new worlds into 
 being. He can will new conceptions, new plans, new 
 enterprises into existence. Having the power to 
 
430 Appendix [Lecture VII 
 
 will new thouglits into existence, He has the power 
 to originate new creations, new. purposes for the 
 glorification of His intelligent creatures, for the 
 adornment of His material universe and the illus- 
 tration of His own glorious perfections. His con- 
 sciousness derived from necessities must be different 
 from His consciousness derived from actual contin- 
 gencies. 
 
 "In these views of the divine nature I am grati- 
 fied in being supported by Dr. Dorner, of the Uni- 
 versity of -Berlin, one who stands in the foremost 
 rank of living Protestant divines. In a recent 
 number of the Bihliotheca Sacra he says: 'Any 
 view of the divine nature that excludes all distinc- 
 tion, movement, and change from God is incom- 
 patible with the idea of creation. The world, as 
 a thought, was a determination given to his mind 
 by God. He must have conceived the world as 
 changeable, or He would not have willed it thus to 
 be. In the divine omniscience there must be an 
 element of growth. If there be free beings, there 
 must be free determinations. God may have a 
 prior knowledge of them as mere possibilities, but 
 He cannot have a knowledge of them as actuali- 
 ties. This knowledge of human acts must be 
 acquired gradually as they come to pass. This 
 knowledge He draws from history, and it is condi- 
 tioned by the action of the causalities which He 
 has brought into existence. In His counsels, in 
 His knowledge, and in His volitions with respect 
 to the world, in His relations to time and space, 
 God is not unchangeable. In these regards He 
 
Lecture VII] Appendix 431 
 
 undergoes movement and change, and suffers Him- 
 self to be conditioned.' " — L. D. McCabe, Divine 
 Nescience (New York, Phillips & Hunt, 1882), 
 pp. 25-27. 
 
 "The doctrine of God's perfect foreknowledge 
 is not only unphilosophical, but also unscriptural. 
 The Bible exhorts us to the deepest earnestness in 
 prayer — to downright importunity — and encour- 
 ages us to believe that the fervent prayer of the 
 righteous man availeth much. No petitioner can 
 plead with any genuine unction unless he believes 
 that he can actually effect some change in the pur- 
 poses existing in the divine mind at the time his 
 prayer is offered. If he were convinced that every- 
 thing had been prearranged from all eternity; that 
 his tears and sighs and passionate words of longing 
 had been present in God's mind always; that they 
 never liad exerted, and never could exert, any in- 
 fluence, effect any change, as there could never be 
 a time when they would first arrest God's atten- 
 tion, — how could he wrestle, agonize, in prayer? 
 It would seem but empty show to him, that he was 
 merely playing a part. Every word he uttered 
 would fall ba-ck dead. If he believes in God's 
 foreknowledge, he must, while he prays, if he 
 prays as the Bible commands, utterly forget his 
 belief and fall into the temporary delusion that 
 the matter is yet undetermined; that God's heart 
 is tender, can be moved; that His purposes can be 
 changed. He must forget his belief, must go ahead 
 just as if foreknowledge were not true. Think you 
 
432 Appendix [Lecture VII 
 
 God would force His children to such straits, to 
 such mental stultification? . . . 
 
 "I am now ready to answer the question, How 
 can we reasonably hope by our petitions to effect a 
 change in the divine purposes, and why should we 
 plead importunately, why kindle our souls into such 
 intensity of fervour? The Scriptures in enjoining 
 earnestness need not be understood as favouring 
 attempts to coax and tease God, as we too fre- 
 quently do our earthly parents, to act against His 
 better judgment out of some weak, short-sighted 
 sympathy. If that be our purpose, we may be cer- 
 tain of flat failure. Our prayers will never induce 
 Him to deal any more generously with us. He has 
 always stood with outstretched arms, with over- 
 flowing sympathy, waiting impatiently to bless us. 
 What untold wealth of deep inventive thought, 
 what untold seons of slowly passing years. He has 
 already lavished in His preparations for our com- 
 ing, for our maintenance, for our unfolding, for 
 our permanent weal ! While our prayers will not 
 make Him any more kindly disposed, will not 
 noticeably increase His sympatliy for us, they 
 will in most marked measure increase His sym- 
 pathy ivith us, will profoundly change our attitude 
 toward Him and multiply our capacity for blessing 
 ten thousand fold. Indeed, so radical is the change 
 wrought, that wliat would have been poison before, 
 becomes medicine now. We thus furnish God new 
 facts upon which to act — facts of mental attitude, 
 the unforeseen outputs of our sovereignty. That 
 attitude is one of Christ-like love, manifesting it- 
 
Lecture VII] Appendix 433 
 
 self in five forms, — that of willing obedience, of 
 self-sacrificing service, of sense of divine depend- 
 ence, of restful confidence, and of intensest long- 
 ing. Until that attitude is attained in all these 
 its prime essentials, God, if He should interfere 
 by stepping outside His general providence, in 
 which the evil and the good are served alike, to 
 confer special favours, would be doing violence to 
 His conceptions of fitness and of true beneficence, 
 would work His children a most positive injury, 
 placing a premium on qualities that stand over 
 against these forms of love, thereby countenancing 
 a spirit of rebellion, selfishness, self-sufficiency, 
 distrust, and ignoble apathy. It is the fervent 
 prayer of the righteous man that availeth much. 
 He must be righteous and his righteousness must 
 be on fire to fulfil the Scripture conditions. That 
 availing power is something more than retroac- 
 tive; it moves the arm that moves the world. As 
 this is a moral state of the soul within the circle of 
 its sovereignty, the product of its absolutely free 
 choice, there cannot be, as I have shown, any 
 sure prophecy of its coming. But when it comes, 
 all barriers are burned away. Reserve gives place 
 to closest, sympathetic intimacy. What more nat- 
 ural, when the spirits of father and son thus meet 
 and mingle, than that the son, care-cumbered it 
 may be, or broken with grief, or baffled in pur- 
 pose, though battling still, should pour out in most 
 impassioned utterance his deep and noble longings? 
 Love itself would so prompt; for love casteth out 
 fear, is the very essence of liberty. Cautious re- 
 
 2f 
 
434 Appendix [Lecture VIII 
 
 serve cannot live in its atmosphere of holy confi- 
 dence. All curtains of concealment fall instantly 
 at tlie magic touch of sympathy. He could not 
 keep his longings back. His father's tender look 
 and tone would break the seals of silence, would 
 touch his lips with coals of fire. The thought of 
 trying by coaxing to melt down his stern reluc- 
 tance is utterly foreign to such a scene, repugnant 
 to such a state, and was never contemplated in the 
 Gospel. What more natural than that God's heart 
 should be deeply stirred by the fervid outflow of 
 such a passion of love and longing, and that He 
 should by direct will-power supply the deficiencies 
 of His general providence, or by timely suggestions 
 reveal its resources, and place them in reach to meet 
 the needs of such a soul in such an hour?" — Wil- 
 liam W. KixsLEY, Old Faiths and Neio Facts (New 
 York, Appletons, 189G), pp. 81, 90-92. 
 
 LECTURE VIII 
 
 Note 60. Page 297.— " We can make this clear by 
 considering that property, private property, is the 
 condition of the best social order. The best social 
 order results from the social union and co-opera- 
 tion of the highest type of men and women ; and 
 the highest type of manhood and womanhood can 
 only be produced when men and women have the 
 free use of property. Property is, indeed, the raw 
 material for the development of character. It is 
 in property, Hegel says, that my will is made real 
 for me as a personal will. Property is the concen- 
 
Lecture VIII] Appendix 435 
 
 trated form of power, and it is in the exercise of 
 power that my will is trained and disciplined. 
 
 "It is in the realm of property rights and obliga- 
 tions that my personality is largely shaped. Until 
 I have learned to use property conscientiousl}'' and 
 beneficently, I have not equipped myself for the 
 highest service of my fellow-men. In making it 
 the instrument of promoting human welfare, more 
 than in any other possible way, I socialize my own 
 will, and prepare myself to enter into helpful rela- 
 tions with my fellow-men. I cannot learn this 
 lesson in the use of property which I hold in com- 
 mon with my fellows. It must be my own ; I must 
 be free to express my own will in dealing with it; 
 I cannot be unselfish in the use of that which is 
 not mine; the most direct and effective discipline 
 in unselfishness is that which is gained in using 
 private propert}^ beneficently. 
 
 " The fundamental assumption of socialism seems 
 to be that if men possess private property they 
 will use it selfishly; therefore, the socialists say, 
 we will have no private property. The remedy 
 would not be effectual. It is rather difficult to 
 abolish all vestiges of private property. Hands 
 and feet and eyes and tongues are possessions and 
 instruments not easily alienated, and those who 
 would use money or machinery selfishly would be 
 quite sure to go on using all their persoiial powers 
 in the same way after they were divested of money 
 and machinery; claws and fists and elbows and 
 teeth would still be private property, and a very 
 unsocial use might be made of them. Unless the 
 
436 Appendix [Lectuue viii 
 
 will lias been socialized, unless men have learned 
 how to use all their powers and possessions for the 
 common welfare, the society in which they live will 
 bear very little resemblance to heaven, no matter 
 how small their personal belongings may be." — 
 Washington Gladden, Ruling Ideas of the Present 
 Age (Boston, Houghton, MifEin, & Co., 1895), pp. 
 7C-79. 
 
 Note 61. Page 298. — " Love seeks the true good 
 of the person loved. It will not minister in an 
 unworthy way to afford a temporary pleasure. It 
 will not approve nor tolerate that which is wrong. 
 It will not encourage the coarse, base passions of 
 the one loved. It condemns impurity, falseness, 
 selfishness. A parent, we say, does not really 
 love his child if he tolerates the self-indulgence 
 and does not correct or punish the faults of the 
 child. Faithful are the wounds of a friend. Love 
 discriminates. It admires only that which is 
 worthy of admiration. It cannot consent to, much 
 less approve, anything unworthy of the loved one. 
 The more love the more condemnation of that 
 which is unlovely. What has been said of the 
 divine love is true of human love: 
 
 ' The very wrath from pity grew, 
 From love of men the hate of wrong.' 
 
 Love has a high ideal of the person loved, and 
 is devoted to the attainment of that ideal. Love 
 seeks righteousness, and is satisfied with nothing 
 less and nothing other than that. 
 
 " Should not one be seeking the same things for 
 
Lecture VIIIJ Appendix 437 
 
 himself that he seeks for others? Shoukl he not 
 have the same ideal for himself? Is not the good- 
 ness he would promote in a friend the very good- 
 ness he should be striving to promote in his. own 
 character? If I love another, I seek his pei-fec- 
 tion. But I should seek my own perfection. 
 Therefore I should love myself. In fact, the very 
 best way to promote the goodness of another is to 
 cultivate my own goodness. To be of the right 
 character gives the power and the only power of 
 loving and serving others. Example is the best 
 service love can render. If one is seeking the 
 wrong things for himself, he cannot be seeking 
 the right things for his friend, except as he dis- 
 approves his own wrongness, and is a warning to 
 his friend. Now we understand self-love. The 
 representation of love as including self is by no 
 means a far-fetched and circuitous way of think- 
 ing. In the complete summary of moral law, a 
 summary which is almost universally accepted, 
 two great principles are laid down, one of which 
 gives as much importance to self-love as to love 
 for others, and even makes self-love tlie rule and 
 type of love to others. ' Thou shalt love thy 
 neighbour as thyself,' is the second of two great 
 commandments on which hang all the moral x)re- 
 cepts of law-givers and prophets. The comparison 
 has respect, not to quantity, but to quality. It does 
 not mean that one is to love his neighbour as much 
 as he loves himself, that he is to give just as much 
 time, thought, care, service, to his neighbour as he 
 gives to himself, in as equal division as possible. 
 
438 Appendix [Lecture VIII 
 
 It means that one is to love his neighbour in the 
 same way as he loves himself, in the same manner, 
 after the same fashion, with the same objects in 
 view, like as he loves himself. It is not the 'as ' 
 of degree but the 'as ' of kind. As thou lovest 
 thyself so shalt thou love thy neighbour. The 
 soul's goods one seeks for himself are the soul's 
 goods he should seek for his neighbour. Therefore 
 one must love himself aright in order to love his 
 neighbour aright. According to this comprehensive 
 precept, self-love is not derived from love to others, 
 but love to others gets its pattern and therefore its 
 measure from love to self. This is as distinct a 
 declaration of self-love as could possibly be made, 
 and certainly on the best authority. The somewhat 
 similar precept which is found both in Christian 
 and in Confucian ethics, — to do unto others as 
 you would that they should do unto you, — indi- 
 cates the right every one has that others should 
 seek his good, as well as his duty to seek their good, 
 and so objectifies self as needing love and service. 
 If one is entitled to the efforts of others for his 
 good, he certainly is required to serve himself as he 
 would have others serve him and as he ought to serve 
 them." — George Harris, Moral Evolution (Bos- 
 ton, Houghton, Mifflin, «& Co., 1896), pp. 138-141. 
 
 Note 62. Page 300. — ■ " For, college or school, uni- 
 versity or institute, the beneficiaries of every en- 
 dowed seat of learning or of art are by their very 
 relation constituted the heirs and the almoners of 
 a great fiduciary trust. 
 
Lecture VIIT] Appendix 439 
 
 "Ability is answerability — everywhere and all 
 ways. Private possession, all possession is a imblic 
 trust! Accountability cannot be escaped. 
 
 "There are two sorts of souls. Those who seek 
 for themselves the advantages of things as they 
 are, and those who seek to give themselves to the 
 advantage of things as they ought to be, and there- 
 fore may be made to be; those who accept ad- 
 vancement, and those who confer it; those who 
 would exploit the world, and those who would save 
 it, — benefactors and malefactors, — Christ and the 
 thieves ! 
 
 "Each one of us, to the extent of that endow- 
 ment which God gives him, is a legatee that he 
 may be a steward. It is the common law of all 
 trusts that they cannot be delegated. They must be 
 executed or defaulted. In the court of the supreme 
 surrogate, many a will constitutes an indictment. 
 
 "And what is true in the stewardship of crass 
 material wealth is also true in the stewardship of 
 mental and administrative ability. Who can, must. 
 
 " The sybarite who uses an elegant and fastidious 
 leisure in purveying to mere literary taste, who is 
 dainty in mere editions, a glutton in books, and 
 who in the seclusion of a library ignores or dis- 
 dains the woe of the world, makes of his know- 
 ledge a toy and not a tool. He, too, is but a miser. 
 
 "This strenuous age, wherein still the 'people 
 are destroyed for lack of knowledge,' demands of 
 us our all and our best. 
 
 "If shadows are to fall from the truth, and 
 falsehood die, the times challenge and demand 
 
440 Appendix [Lecture VIII 
 
 souls who shall be filled with the instinct of help 
 and wear on helmet and brow Icli Dlen, souls ablaze 
 with that love which ever 'seeketh not her own/ 
 and who, trained for resolute, aggressive, and 
 undaunted leadership, are exemplars in interpret- 
 ing every least task by the largest ideals." — M. 
 W. Strykee, Hamilton, Lincoln, and Other Ad- 
 dresses (Utica, 1896), "The Stewardship of Know- 
 ledge," pp. 96, 97. 
 
 Note 63. Page 304. — " It was held that a Chris- 
 tian should have such a desire for the glory of God 
 that he should be willing to be condemned ever- 
 lastingly if it would promote it. The futility of 
 such a supposition is seen when it is put in the 
 form of this question, 'Can a man so love God as 
 to be willing, for any end, everlastingly to hate 
 Him? ' These are such unnatural issues that it 
 would be hard to prove God could ever propose 
 them to intelligent creatures, or intelligent creat- 
 ures realize them as possible, except in the over- 
 refinement of speculation." — JoHx Ker, Sermons 
 (Edinburgh, Douglas, 1885), pp. 103, 104. 
 
 Note 64. Page 305. — "These chapters of the 
 Epistle to the Eomans have been, by scholastic 
 theology, put to uses for Avhich they were never 
 intended. They are not a contribution to the 
 doctrine of the eternal predestination of individu- 
 als to everlasting life or death. Their theme is 
 not the election of individuals, but of a people. 
 And the point of view from which the princij^le 
 
Lecture VIII] Appendix 441 
 
 of election is contemplated is historical. The 
 writer treats of divine choices as they reveal them- 
 selves in this world in the career and destiny of 
 nations. But still more important is it to note 
 that in these chapters election is not conceived of 
 as an arbitrary choice to the enjoyment of benefits 
 from which all others are excluded. Election is 
 to function as well as to favour, and the function 
 has the good of others besides the elect in view. 
 As the Jews, according to the Hebrew Scriptures, 
 were chosen to be a blessing eventually to the 
 Gentiles, so, according to the apostle, the Gentile 
 no-nations were chosen in turn to be God's people, 
 for their own good, doubtless, but also for the spir- 
 itual benefit of the temporarily disinherited Jews. 
 It is unnecessary to point out that this view is in 
 accordance with the uniform teaching of Scripture, 
 and very specially with the teaching of Christ, in 
 which the elect appear as the light, the salt, and 
 the leaven of the world. It is a vital truth 
 strangely overlooked in elaborate creeds large 
 enough to have room for many doctrines much 
 less important, and far from sufficiently recog- 
 nized, as yet, even in the living faith of the 
 Church, though the missionary spirit of modern 
 Christianity may be regarded as an unconscious 
 homage to its importance." — Prof. A. B. Bruce, 
 St. PauVs Conception of Christianity (New York, 
 Scribners, 1894), pp. 321 fe. 
 
 Note 65. Page 306. — "Whatever else may or 
 may not be taught in the New Testament, the 
 
442 Appendix [Lecture VIII 
 
 twofold law of love is there given as tlie great 
 commandment of the old dispensation, and enforced 
 by the obedience of Christ as of like rank in the 
 new; as authoritative for him and for all his. 
 The obligation to love God is stated explicitly 
 enough. The command to love our neighbour, like 
 to the other in its binding force, has for its inter- 
 pretation the lifelong sacrifice by which Christ 
 gave for the world's welfare all that He had to 
 give. His whole business on earth was to express 
 that perfect love for God's creatures which is the 
 obverse of His perfect love for God. As if to 
 guard the duty of beneficence against misappre- 
 hension or neglect, He not only taught human kind- 
 ness as in the parable of the Good Samaritan, but 
 in a passage of prophecy which might well be in 
 the ritual of every church, He made the dread 
 decisions of the judgment to turn not on doc- 
 trine but on conduct, not on the moral law in 
 general but on the law of beneficence in particu- 
 lar. This is the style of His teaching who went 
 about doiug good. Well might Paul sing the 
 psalm of 'Charity,' and John declare that God is 
 love. 
 
 "If the law of love has such implications and 
 such tremendous sanctions, there seems to be no 
 escape from the proposition that every man ought 
 to do his absolute utmost for the well-being of his 
 fellow-creatures." — James P. Kelley, The Law 
 of Service (G. P. Putnam's Sons, New York, 1894), 
 pp. 4, 5. 
 
Lecture VIII] Appendix 443 
 
 "In practice under the law we have set forth, 
 one serves God and himself, by serving his 
 fellow-creatures. Worship, like the expression 
 of filial affection, is natural and spontaneous. 
 Its public forms, like the decorous customs of 
 the household, are determined by fitness and use- 
 fulness. Its architecture and accessories are not 
 according to the wealth and social position of 
 the worshipper, but, again, are for fitness and 
 use, and are limited by the economies of ser- 
 vice. Service of fellow-creatures is the one 
 business and study of life; service of self is inci- 
 dental or indirect. Giving of mind, body, and 
 estate is the normal process, the daily joy of life; 
 inability or failure to give it its chief distress. 
 Self-indulgence beyond rational use is disrepu- 
 table ; private display is both ungenerous and vul- 
 gar. Public spirit, with all that it implies, is the 
 natural atmosphere of the life of Service; public 
 misfortune a personal grief, public disgrace a per- 
 sonal shame. The welfare of the nation, not as a 
 jealous competing neighbour of other states, but as 
 a generous and beneficent member of the common- 
 wealth of nations, is the glory and pride of the 
 Christian citizen. 
 
 " The world is grievously afflicted. The church 
 has doctored the symptoms of its ailment empiri- 
 cally, in an intermittent and emotional way. 
 According to the law of service, we are to deal 
 scientifically with the disease itself by radical and 
 constitutional treatment. The springs of human 
 life must be cleansed, its processes made normal 
 
444 Appendix [Lecture VllI 
 
 and vigorous, its activities reformed. We have 
 reckoned on selfishness as the motive of human 
 action: let us have the faith and courage to reckon 
 on love. Self-seeking competition is war with all 
 its miseries; generous service is peace with all its 
 blessings." — /6i(Z., pp. 142, 143. 
 
 Note 66. Page 311. — "Christ chose a small 
 body of disciples to be in close contact with Him- 
 self, to share His work, and to receive His deeper 
 teaching. This will not surprise us after the 
 analogies of the prophets, the poets, the artists of 
 the world. The saints, too, may be few, and God 
 may lend their spirits out for the good of others. 
 But, moreover, in the first formation of the Church 
 we are able to watch the process of limitation, 
 as historically Avorked out; and we see that it 
 arises not from any narrowness, any grudging of 
 His blessings, on the part of Christ, but from the 
 narrowness, the limitations in man. Man is 
 'straitened ' not in God, not in Christ, but in 
 his own affections. God willed all men to be 
 saved; Christ went about doing good and calling 
 all to a change of heart, to a share in the kingdom 
 of Heaven ; but such a call made demands upon His 
 hearers; it required that they should give up old 
 prejudices about the Messianic kingdom, that they 
 should be willing to leave father and mother and 
 houses and lands for the truth's sake, that they 
 should lay aside all the things that defile a man, 
 that they should aim at being perfect, that they 
 should not only hear but understand the word, 
 
Lecture VIII] Appendix 445 
 
 that they should trust Him even when His sayings 
 were hard. And these demands produced the limi- 
 tations. The Pharisees preferred the glory of men 
 to the glory which came from God; the masses in 
 Galilee cared only for the bread that perisheth; 
 many of the disciples turned back; and so He 
 could not commit Himself unto them, because He 
 knew what was in man. Not to them, not to any 
 chance person, but to the Twelve, to those who had 
 stood these tests, to those who had, in spite of all 
 perplexity, seen in Him the Son of the Living 
 God, to them He could commit Himself; they 
 could share His secrets; they could be taught 
 clearly the certainty and the meaning of His com- 
 ing death, for they had begun to learn what 
 self-sacrifice meant; they could do His work and 
 organize His Church; they could bind and loose 
 in His name; they could represent Him when He 
 was gone. These are the elect; they who had the 
 will to listen to the call; they who were 'magnani- 
 mous to correspond with heaven ' ; to them He 
 gave at Pentecost the full conscious gift of the 
 Holy Spirit, and so at last formed them into the 
 Church, the Church which was to continue His 
 work, which was to convey His grace, which was 
 to go into the whole world, holding this life as a 
 treasure for the sake of the whole world, praying 
 and giving thanks for all men, because the unity 
 of God and the unity of the mediation of Christ 
 inspires them Avith hope that all may be one in 
 mm.'' — Lux Mundi, pp. 372, 373. 
 
INDEX 
 
 Abbott, Lyman, Christicoi 
 Thought, 410 note ; The 
 Evolution of Christianity, 
 417 note. 
 
 Absolutism, difficulties of, 263. 
 
 Ackerman, 'L.,Ma Vie, quoted, 
 250. 
 
 Acts, The, of the Apostles, G2. 
 
 Adam, a new, 286. 
 
 Adams, Professor, 12. 
 
 Aiden, 312. 
 
 Altruism, 37, 38. 
 
 Ambrose of Milan, 101. 
 
 iVmerica, the new crusade in, 
 37. 
 
 Ananias, 100. 
 
 Antoninus Pius, 104. 
 
 Aquinas, Thomas, 50, 141. 
 
 Aristotle, 73. 
 
 Arius, 110. 
 
 Armstrong, Prof. A. C, Jr.,34. 
 
 Arnold, Matthew, quoted, 19. 
 
 Art, Christ in, 128; early 
 Christian, 128. 
 
 Atonement, the value of the, 
 1(52. 
 
 Authority is what the age de- 
 mauds, 198, 
 
 Balfour, Hon. A. J., A De- 
 fence of Philosophic Doubt, 
 48, 325, 340, 342 notes ; Foun- 
 dations of a Belief, 52. 
 
 Baptized fatalism, 217. 
 
 Barry, Alfred, Some Lights 
 of Science on the Faith, 68, 
 371 note. 
 
 Baudelaire, Charles, 18, 29. 
 
 Baxter, Richard, 50. 
 
 Beauchamp, Henry, Thoughts 
 of an Automaton, 210. 
 
 Beaumont and Fletcher, 73. 
 
 Berthelot, M., 13. 
 
 Bettelheim, Anton, Cosmopo- 
 lis, 334 note. 
 
 Beyschlags, Nexo Testament 
 Theology, 62, 359, 396, 399, 
 416 notes. 
 
 Bible : bending the Bible to fit 
 definitions, 132. 
 
 Biblical scholarship {modern), 
 143. 
 
 Boniface, 312. 
 
 Bourget, Paul, Psychologic 
 Contemporaine, 5 note, 17, 
 28, 30, 324 7Wte, 333 note; 
 Cosmopolis, 17. 
 
 447 
 
448 
 
 Index 
 
 Bradford, Amory H., Hered- 
 ity and Christian Prob- 
 lems, 74, 353 note, 411 note. 
 
 Brain, the organ of the mind, 
 221. 
 
 Brainerd, David, 79. 
 
 Brooks, Bishop, 54 ; Sermon 
 for Trinity Sunday, 112. 
 
 Browning, Kobert, 33; Saul, 
 quoted, 164. 
 
 Bruce, Prof. A. B., St. PauVs 
 Conception of Christianity, 
 440 note; The Humiliation 
 of Christ, 134 ; Kingdom of 
 God, 176, 181. 
 
 Bushnell, Horace, The Divin- 
 ity of Christ, 125. 
 
 Butler, Bishop, 7, 8 no^e,50. 
 
 Byzantine art, 130. 
 
 Calvary is victory, 278. 
 
 Calvin, John, 50, 73, 305. 
 
 Calvinism, 241. 
 
 Candlish, Dr. James ^., King- 
 dom of God, 176. 
 
 Carlyle, Thomas, 16; Heroes, 
 86 note. 
 
 Catacombs, pictures of Christ 
 in, 129. 
 
 Cayley, Professor, 12. 
 
 Chalcedon, 155. 
 
 Charity, the new, 170; true, 
 299. 
 
 Chillingworth, William, 50. 
 
 Christ, Gospel of, 54 ; the per- 
 son of, 58 ; the reality of, 
 58; was his own Gospel, GO; 
 the life of the Church flowed 
 from, 62; the influence of 
 Christianity came from, 64 ; 
 the magic of His name 64 ; 
 
 the personal power of Christ 
 continues, 66; the central 
 figure of Christianity, 66; 
 the mystery of, 69; the 
 effect of His presence, 70; 
 unique, 72; solitary in his- 
 tory, 73; sinless, 74; the 
 power of His cross, 76; to 
 know Him the one thing 
 needful, 78; the answer to 
 sceptics, 87; the creator of 
 Christianity, 88; who then 
 is Christ, 89; the historic 
 answer, 90 ; Godhead slowly 
 revealed, 90 ; a supreme au- 
 thority to judge the world, 
 95; the Son of God, 96; the 
 new theology, 105 ; a per- 
 sonal revelation of the Di- 
 vine Being, 106; His life 
 without admitting His di- 
 vinity, 118 ; divine love, 120 ; 
 is God with us, 121 ; hu- 
 manity, 126 ; in art, 128 ; 
 portraits of, 129; portrait, 
 Byzantine, 130 ; hiding the 
 face of, 132 ; manhood a vest- 
 ure, 138; of the Gospels, 
 144; of the Epistles, 145; 
 the new study of, 154 ; find- 
 ing of the human Christ, 
 164 ; teaching, the kingdom 
 of heaven the keynote of, 
 174; the doctrine of, 182; 
 record of His teaching, 184 ; 
 w^ords and life interpret each 
 other, 186; teaching, the 
 authority of, 189; teaching, 
 the originality of, 190; 
 teaching, universal, 193 ; 
 doctrine small in compass, 
 
Index 
 
 449 
 
 193; doctrine never fails, 
 194 ; the simplicity that is in 
 His teaching, 196; loyalty 
 to His teaching, 197 ; the su- 
 preme authority, 199; our 
 great task to learn his creed, 
 200 ; says liberty is real, 226 ; 
 His preaching a Gospel of 
 liberty, 227 ; is God's call to 
 faith, 232 ; on heredity, 233 ; 
 our helper, 236 ; doctrine of 
 election, 305 ; parables, 307 ; 
 ideal, 310. 
 
 Christhood, what is meant by 
 the, 92. 
 
 Christian leadership, need 
 of, 38 ; belief, the new line 
 of, 92; doctrine and the 
 Deity of Christ, 108 ; view 
 of God and world, 361 
 note ; preacher, the duty 
 of, 316. 
 
 Christianity and Christ, 59; 
 the rock of, 119; practical, 
 171 ; evidences of, 192 ; and 
 communism, 297. 
 
 Christians despised for wor- 
 shipping Christ, 104. 
 
 Christless man can never 
 preach Christ, 202. 
 
 Christology, modern examples 
 of false, 136. 
 
 Clarke, Samuel, 50. 
 
 Clerk-Maxwell, Professor, 12. 
 
 Clifford, W. K., 15, 30, 208. 
 
 College settlements, 38. 
 
 Columba, 312. 
 
 Conscience, the indomitable, 
 35. 
 
 Couperus, Louis, Destiny, 213. 
 
 Crassus, 73. 
 
 2g 
 
 Creed, The, of Christ, 200; of 
 
 necessity, 212. 
 Crispi, Signor, 34. 
 Crosby, Howard, The True 
 
 Humanity of Christ, quoted, 
 
 155. 
 Cross: power of the cross of 
 
 Christ, 76. 
 Crusade against scepticism, 37. 
 Cudworth, Ralph, 50. 
 
 Darwin, the testimony of a 
 doubter, 67. 
 
 Deity of Christ, the strength 
 of the Gospel, 122. 
 
 De Fvessejise, Jesus Christ, 162. 
 
 Desjardins, Paul, 18, 27, 36. 
 
 Determinism proved, 218. 
 
 Devout men of pure science, 
 12. 
 
 Disciple, The, must be as his 
 Lord, 306. 
 
 Discrimination, 2(i0. 
 
 Divine, The, Orderliness, 255; 
 immanence, 255; omnipo- 
 tence self-limited in action, 
 265 ; omniscience, 268. 
 
 Divinity of Jesus Christ, The, 
 355 note. 
 
 Doctrine of Christ, the basis of 
 His conduct, 187 ; attacked, 
 7. 
 
 Dogmas darken the view of 
 Christ, 131. 
 
 Dogmatic theology and mod- 
 ern doubt, 50. 
 
 Dogmatics, renaissance of, 51. 
 
 Dorner, History of Protestant 
 Theology, '61%note. 
 
 Doubt not a crime but a 
 malady, 23. 
 
450 
 
 Index 
 
 Doubting age, 6. 
 
 Du Bois, Reymoud, 13. 
 
 Du Maurier, George, 18. 
 
 Earth, militant on, 268. 
 
 Edwards, Jonathan, 50, 218, 
 305. 
 
 Election, the doctrine of, 302; 
 perverted in human theol- 
 ogy, 304. 
 
 Eliot, George, 17, 25. 
 
 Emerson, 16. 
 
 Endurance, strength of, 275. 
 
 English sceptics, 25. 
 
 Ephrem Syrus, 101, 133. 
 
 Epistles, The, of Paul, 62. 
 
 Erasmus, quoted in Gore, 142. 
 
 Everlasting, The, Realltij of 
 Religion, 329 note. 
 
 Evil, origin of evil not in God, 
 266; power of, 272; strug- 
 gle against, 274. 
 
 Fairbairn, A. M., The Place 
 of Christ in Modern The- 
 ology, 51, 153, 357 note, 364 
 note, 393 note. 
 
 Faith not changed but en- 
 larged, 10 ; sorrow of losing, 
 25 ; the renaissance of, 33 ; 
 a starting-point for, 53 ; the 
 original process of, 91 ; three 
 vital points made plain to 
 faith, 151 ; these points de- 
 fended, 152. 
 
 False interpretations of 
 Christ's teaching, 175. 
 
 Fatalism, modern, 206. 
 
 Felicity, the secret of, 293. 
 
 Ferrers, Professor, 12. 
 
 Fiction, gloomy, 17. 
 
 Fisher, Prof. G. P., 219; 
 Grounds of Theistic and 
 Christian Belief, 62 note, 
 424 note. 
 
 Fiske, John, 247 ; Destiny of 
 Man, 326 note ; Idea of God, 
 327 note. 
 
 Fitzgerald, Edward, Rubdiydt 
 of Omar Khayyam, quoted, 
 217. 
 
 Flaubert, 29 ; Madame B ovary, 
 17. 
 
 Foreknowledge, 269. 
 
 Foster, John, 5. 
 
 France, new crusade in, 36. 
 
 Fraternity better than equal- 
 ity, 296. 
 
 Free-will, 219; is possible, 225. 
 
 French sceptics, 27. 
 
 Froude, 16. 
 
 Gibbon, Edward, Roman Em- 
 pire, 83. 
 
 Gilder, Richard Watson, quo- 
 tation, 79. 
 
 Gladden, Washington, Ruling 
 Ideas of the Present Age, 
 434 7iote. 
 
 God seen through Christ, 107 ; 
 a personal, 117; the true 
 view of, 160; is love, 161; 
 suffers with and for us, 162; 
 helps those who help them- 
 selves, 238; the Father, our 
 Captain, 251; in His world, 
 254; reign of God through 
 law, 258 ; is a fair master, 
 265; the rock of our trust, 
 273; in history, 276; and 
 truth, 277 ; is God unjust, 302. 
 
 Godet, 154. 
 
Index 
 
 451 
 
 God's sympathy, doubts dis- 
 solve in the thought of, 1G3 ; 
 sovereignty, two spheres of, 
 267. 
 
 Goodness, power of, 272. 
 
 Gordon, Charles, 79. 
 
 Gordon, Dr. George A., The 
 Trinity the Ground of Hu- 
 manity, 112; Christ of To- 
 day, 52, 342 note, 374 7iote. 
 
 Gore, Canon C. C, 135, 13G; 
 The Incarnation of the Son 
 of God, 134, 351 7iote, 366 
 note ; Dissertations, 384 
 note, 427 note. 
 
 Gospel, The, of a Person, 
 43; message clear as light, 
 53; of a fact, 55; of a 
 force, 59; of a Saviour, 
 75 ; of the Incarnation 
 adapted to this age, 113; 
 A., for the whole circle of 
 human life, 173 ; the fourth, 
 178. 
 
 Gospels: the four Gospels 
 must be studied, 177. 
 
 Greer, David H. , The Preacher, 
 322 710^6. 
 
 Gregory the Great, 102. 
 
 Hadrian, Emperor, 104. 
 
 Happiness depends upon our 
 inward state, 289 ; the secret 
 of, 290. 
 
 Hardy, Thomas, 17 ; Jude the 
 Obscure, 30. 
 
 Harris, S., The Self -Revela- 
 tion of God, 51. 
 
 Harris, George, Moral Evolu- 
 tion, 436 note. 
 
 Harrison, Frederic, 15. 
 
 Hartmaun, 24, 33; Religions- 
 philosophie Selbstersetzung 
 des Christenthums, 33 ; 
 Philosophic des Unbewuss- 
 ten, 34. 
 
 Havelock, Henry, 79. 
 
 Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 283. 
 
 Hazard, 230. 
 
 Hazzard, Rowland, Freedom 
 of Mind in Willing, 219. 
 
 Heathen, testimony of the, 
 103; writers, 103. 
 
 Heaven, triumphant in, 268. 
 
 Hebrews, the epistle to the, 
 149. 
 
 Hennell, Charles, Inquh^ 
 Concerning the Origin of 
 Christianity, 25. 
 
 Heredity not final, 222. 
 
 Hilary of Poictiers, 101. 
 
 Historical Christ, 58. 
 
 Hitchcock, Rev. Dr. Roswell 
 D., A Complete Analysis of 
 the Holy Bible, 176. 
 
 Hodge, Charles, 50. 
 
 Hodge, A. A., Popular Lect- 
 ures, 241. 
 
 Holy Spirit, The, 236. 
 
 Homoousia, 155. 
 
 Hooker, Richard, 50. 
 
 Horton, R. F., Verbum Dei, 
 322 ?iote. 
 
 Human, The, Life of the 
 Father, 81; Life in God, 
 125. 
 
 Humanity, a new relation to, 
 94. 
 
 Hutton, R. H., 27; Contem- 
 porary Thought and Think- 
 ers, 417 note. 
 
 Huxley, T. H., 15 ; quoted, 208. 
 
452 
 
 Index 
 
 Hymns of the Greek Church, 
 
 101 ; the testimony of, 101. 
 Hypnotized, the age, 211. 
 
 Ibsen's plays, 27 note ; Ghosts, 
 214. 
 
 Ignatius, Epistles of, to the 
 Trallians, oil note. 
 
 Illingworth, J. R., Personality 
 Human and Divine, 344 
 note, 358. 
 
 Incarnation, The, 114, 115 ; his- 
 torically consistent, 118 ; 
 satisfies the human heart, 
 120; old definitions inade- 
 quate, 156. 
 
 Inequality in the spiritual 
 world, 301. 
 
 Influence of Fiction, ^'62 note. 
 
 Inspiration of heroism, 274. 
 
 Irenaeus, quoted, 94, 376 note. 
 
 Jackson, Dr. J. Hughlings, Dis- 
 eases of Nervous System, 121. 
 
 James, William, Psychology, 
 224, 230, 413 note, 414 note. 
 
 Jesus, search after, 141 ; secret 
 of, 258; the new Adam, 287. 
 
 Jesus Christ's doctrine small 
 in compass, 193. 
 
 John, 100. 
 
 Jonson, Ben, 73. 
 
 Joy is a duty, 293. 
 
 Judas, 99. 
 
 Justin Martyr, First Apology, 
 quoted, 104; Dialogue loith 
 Trypho, 65 riote. 
 
 Kant, 210. 
 
 Kelley, James P., The Law of 
 Service, 441 note, 443 note. 
 
 Kelvin, Lord (Sir William 
 Thomson), 12, 220. 
 
 KemiMs, Thomas a, 79; Imi- 
 tation of Christ, 66. 
 
 Kenosis, the, 147. 
 
 Kepler, 12. 
 
 Ker, John, Sermons, 440 note. 
 
 Kidd, Mr. Benjamin, Social 
 Evolution, 34. 
 
 Kinship of man to God, 159. 
 
 Kingdom, The, of heaven the 
 keynote of Christ's teach- 
 ing, 174. 
 
 Kingsley, Charles, 79. 
 
 Kinsley, William W., Old 
 Faiths and Nev) Facts, 431 
 7iote. 
 
 Knowledge, the expansion of, 
 11. 
 
 Lacordaire, Pere, 53. 
 
 La Farge, John, Considera- 
 tions on Painting, 376 note. 
 
 Laplace, 247. 
 
 Latham, Henry, Pastor Pas- 
 torum, 61. 
 
 Lentulus, Epistle of, 129. 
 
 Lesson of encouragement in 
 sufferings of doubt, 24. 
 
 Liberty, sovereignty, and ser- 
 vice, 206. 
 
 Liberty, 207. 
 
 Liddon, Canon, 53 ; Divinity 
 of Our Lord, 138. 
 
 Life, sad aspect of, 27 ; the 
 regnant idea, 157; the un- 
 evenuess and apparent in- 
 justice of human life, 284; 
 the compensation of, 291. 
 
 Lightfoot, Bishop, Supernal- 
 ural Religion, 62 note. 
 
Index 
 
 453 
 
 Lincoln, A., 118. 
 
 Lisle, Leconte de, 18. 
 
 Literature as an index of life, 
 4; mirror of, and the shad- 
 ow of doubt, 15. 
 
 Littre, Emile, 22. 
 
 Liturgies, testimony of early, 
 102. 
 
 Liturgy of Protestant Episco- 
 pal Church, 103. 
 
 Lombard, Peter, 134, 141. 
 
 Lombroso, 45. 
 
 Lord, The, of Hosts, 270. 
 
 Loti, Pierre, La Galilee, 73 
 note, 190. 
 
 Love, Christ's divine love, 
 120; is the example of 
 Christ, 161 ; thy neighbour 
 as thyself, 298. 
 
 Lowell, James Russell, The 
 Present Crisis, quoted, 278. 
 
 Loyalty to Christ's teaching, 
 197. 
 
 Lucian, 104. 
 
 Luther, 73. 
 
 Lux Mxtndi, 323 note, 363, 
 367, 444 note. 
 
 Mabie, H. W., Essays on Nat- 
 ure and Culture, 255. 
 
 McCabe, L. D., Divine Nesci- 
 ence, 428 note. 
 
 McCheyne, Robert, 79. 
 
 Man, meanness of, 28; to God, 
 kinship of, 159; weakness 
 of, 234. 
 
 Man's inhumanity to man, 285. 
 
 Marcus Aurelius, 104. 
 
 Martyn, Henry, 79. 
 
 Materialism disavowed but 
 taught, 207. 
 
 Maupassant, Guy de, 17, 
 215. 
 
 Maurice, F. D., 23. 
 
 Melancholia, 30. 
 
 Melancholy marionettes, 215. 
 
 Melancthon, 73. 
 
 Metaphysical negation, 14. 
 
 Mill, J. S., Essays on Religion, 
 72 note. 
 
 Miracles not against nature, 
 257. 
 
 Misery, source of human, not 
 in poverty, but in a bad 
 heart, 290. 
 
 Misoneism, 45. 
 
 Missionary zeal, 312. 
 
 Missions essential to Chris- 
 tianity, 311 ; and the early 
 church, 312; keep the Gos- 
 pel pure, 312. 
 
 Momerie, A. W., Personality, 
 346 note. 
 
 Moody, Dwight L,, 54. 
 
 Moral problem, 205 ; judg- 
 ments assume liberty, 223. 
 
 INIorley, John, 16. 
 
 INIoxom, Philip S., From Jer- 
 usalem to Nicxa, 370 note. 
 
 Mozley, J. B., Ruling Ideas in 
 Early Ages, 425 note. 
 
 Mulford, The Rejmblic of God, 
 51. 
 
 Miiller, Julius, 153. 
 
 Munger, T. T., The Freedom 
 of Faith, 401 note. 
 
 Myers, F. W. H., 26, 46; Sci- 
 ence and a Future Life, 
 337 note, 339 note. 
 
 Napoleon, 73. 
 Newton, 12. 
 
454 
 
 Index 
 
 Nordeau, Max, Degeneration, 
 45, 404 note. 
 
 Novels, modern, 5 ; of natu- 
 ralism, IT. 
 
 Offices of the Church, 63. 
 
 Oriental religions, 238. 
 
 Orr, James, The Christian 
 Vieiv of God and the World, 
 34, 51, 336 710^6, 395 note. 
 
 Our great task to learn His 
 creed, 200. 
 
 Owen, John, 50. 
 
 Pagan poets, 33. 
 
 Pain, 24; gives argument to 
 
 hope, 31. 
 Paley, Dr., 10. 
 Parables of Christ, 307. 
 Pascal, 28, 36. 
 Patience, rewarded in the life 
 
 to come, 295. 
 Patteson, Coleridge, 79. 
 Peace on earth, 292. 
 Pearson, C. H., The Causes of 
 
 Pessimism, 409 7iote ; iVa- 
 
 tional Life and Character, 
 
 337 note. 
 Personal equation of the age, 3. 
 Personality the foundation of 
 
 all sensation, 56. 
 Personal responsibility, 208. 
 Pessimism, 21. 
 Peter, 100. 
 Pharisees, The, taught fate, 
 
 228. 
 Philosophy, the value of, to 
 
 Christian preacher, 49. 
 Physiognomy of the age, 6. 
 Plato, 73. 
 Pliny the Younger, 86, 103. 
 
 Poetry, despondent, 18. 
 
 Pompey, 73. 
 
 Pope's Essay on Man, quoted, 
 252. 
 
 Portraits of Christ, 129. 
 
 Prayer, 235 ; of intercession, 
 309. 
 
 "Preach Christ," 169; what 
 does it mean, 172. 
 
 Preacher, The, who wishes to 
 speak to this age must read 
 many books, 6 ; how can he 
 serve the present age, 43; 
 first and greatest duty to 
 preach Christ, 55. 
 
 Preachers of Christ, the needs 
 of, 239 ; to proclaim liberty 
 in Christ, 242. 
 
 Preaching with power, 53 ; the 
 Gospel for an age of doubt, 
 314. 
 
 Predestination, 232. 
 
 Prime, W. G., Along Neio Eng- 
 land Roads, 420 note. 
 
 Probation of men, 270. 
 
 Prohlematische Naturen, 17. 
 
 Psychical research, 46. 
 
 Psychological romances, 17 ; 
 problem, 205. 
 
 Psychology, testimony of mod- 
 ern, 224. 
 
 Purves, Rev. G. T., The In- 
 carnation Biblically Con- 
 sidered, 415 note. 
 
 Questioning spirit of to-day, 8. 
 
 Rationalism, thorough-going, 
 
 48. 
 Reading, value of general, 5. 
 Redemption, 237. 
 
Index 
 
 455 
 
 Reformation, spirit of, 14:2, 
 Religion of the IJyidergradu- 
 
 ate, 326 note. 
 Renan, 16, 29, 39. 
 Resurrection of Christ, 98. 
 Reubelt, Scripture Doctrine of 
 
 the Person of Christ, 379 
 
 note, 381 note, 384 note, 386 
 
 note. 
 Revelation, a new, 191. 
 Robertson, Frederick, 79. 
 Rod, M. Edouard, 34; Idees 
 
 Morales du Temps Present, 
 
 403 note. 
 Romanes, George John, 12 
 
 note, 34, 114. 
 Routh, Professor, 12. 
 Ruskiu, John, 258. 
 Russian sceptics, 30. 
 Rutherford, Samuel, 79. 
 
 Saints, Anselm, 50; Athana- 
 sius, 109; Augustine, 32, 
 50, 111,305,312; Sermons 
 on the New Testament 
 Lessons, 392 note. 
 
 Bernard, 79. 
 
 Chrysostom, 53 ; the prayer 
 of, 103, 1,33. 
 
 Clement, First Epistle of, 
 quoted, 107. 
 
 Dominic, .312. 
 
 Francis of Assisi, 53, 79, 
 312. 
 
 James, liturgy of, 102. 
 
 John, 53; the kingdom in, 
 178; Gospel of love, 181. 
 
 Mark, liturgy of, 102. 
 
 Patrick, 312. 
 
 Peter, .53. 
 
 Paul, 53, 78, 307; view of 
 
 Christ, 146; Epistle of 
 Christ's brotherhood, 148; 
 on freedom, 240. 
 
 Saints called to endure heavy 
 trials, 274. 
 
 Salmon, Dr., Introduction to 
 the JYeio Testament, 62 note. 
 
 Saul of Tarsus, 99. 
 
 Savonarola, 53. 
 
 Scepticism, causes of, 9; at- 
 tributed to the growth of 
 our conception of the phy- 
 sical magnitude of the uni- 
 verse, 11 ; in modern litera- 
 ture, 24. 
 
 Sceptic's account of the spread 
 of Christianity, 83. 
 
 Scherer, 16. 
 
 Schopenhauer, 24. 
 
 Science and religion, 9; not 
 hostile to religion, 9; arro- 
 gance of, falsely so-called, 
 12 ; the boundaries of, 247. 
 
 Scott, Sir Walter, 6. 
 
 Scudder, Vida D., The Life of 
 the Spirit in Modern Eng- 
 lish Poets, 33. 
 
 " Sea Dreams," by Tennyson, 
 quoted, 20. 
 
 Sermons, lay, 15. 
 
 Sermon on the Mount, 93. 
 
 Service, 283; the keynote of 
 the kingdom, 308. 
 
 Shairp, John Campbell, quota- 
 tion, 202. 
 
 Shakespeare, 73. 
 
 Shedd, Dr. W. G. T., 50; Dog- 
 matic Theology, 137. 
 
 Shelley, quoted, 16, 25. 
 
 Signs of reaction, 33; of the 
 times, 39. 
 
456 
 
 Index 
 
 Simplicity, The, that is in 
 Christ, 196. 
 
 Sin is the work of an enemy, 
 267. 
 
 Sinlessness of Christ, 74, 
 
 Social regeneration, 300. 
 
 Socrates, 73. 
 
 Source, The, of Authority, 
 167. 
 
 Source, The, of authority in 
 the kingdom of heaven, 169. 
 
 Sovereignty, 247 ; the ques- 
 tion of, 249; mechanical, 
 260; embraces liberty, 271. 
 
 Spielhagen, 17. 
 
 Spirit, the questioning, 7. 
 
 Stalker, James, Imago Christi, 
 195 note. 
 
 Stendhal, Rouge et Noir, 29. 
 
 Stephen, the martyr, 99. 
 
 Stephen, Sir J. Fitzjames, Lib- 
 erty, Equality, and Frater- 
 nity, 55, .343 note. 
 
 Stevens, George B., The Paul- 
 ine Theology, 65 note, 100, 
 352 note. 
 
 Stokes, Sir George, 12. 
 
 Strauss, David Friedrich, 32 
 note. 
 
 Stryker, M. W., Hamilton, 
 Lincoln, and other ad- 
 dresses, 438 note. 
 
 Sully, James, 24 note ; Pessi- 
 mism, 332 7iote. 
 
 Sympathy with doubt, 22 ; of 
 the age, 284. 
 
 Synoptics, The, 178. 
 
 Taine, 29. 
 
 Tait, Professor, 12. 
 
 Talbot's Analysis, 176. 
 
 Tennyson, quoted, 19, 33 ; The 
 Higher Pantheism, quoted, 
 159. 
 
 Theological fortiiication, 49; 
 problem, 205. 
 
 Theology, the future of, 51 ; 
 current theology at fault, 
 150 ; has lost sight of Christ's 
 humanity, 126. 
 
 Thomson, James, The City of 
 Dreadful Night, 31. 
 
 Thomson, Dr. W. H., Material- 
 ism and Modeim Physiology 
 of the Nervous System, 221. 
 
 Thompson, Joseph P., The 
 Theology of Christ from 
 His own Woixls, 397 note. 
 
 Three great problems, 205; 
 great truths, 206. 
 
 Todhunter, Professor, 12. 
 
 Trask, Katrina, A Night and 
 Morning in Jerusalem, quot- 
 ed, 185. 
 
 Trinity, 111 ; the doctrine of, 
 108. 
 
 Truth, a new power to reveal, 
 93. 
 
 Tyudall, Professor, 15, 208. 
 
 Unbelief, respectful, 8. 
 Universe, the magnitude of, 11. 
 Unveiling, The, of the Father, 
 83. 
 
 Van Dyke, Henry, Poetry of 
 
 Tennyson, 33. 
 Virgin Mary, worship of, 140. 
 
 Wagner, Charles, 13 note. 
 Ward, Mrs. Humphry, Robert 
 
 Elsmere, 17, 30. 
 Warner, Charles Dudley, 215 ; 
 
Index 
 
 457 
 
 Fatalism in Modern Fiction, 
 408 7iote. 
 
 Weiss, Bernhard, Lehrhuch 
 der Biblischen Theologie 
 des Neuen Testaments, 188, 
 400 note. 
 
 Wesley, John, 53. 
 
 Westcott, Bishop, IGl; The 
 Incarnation and Common 
 Life, 301; The Gospel of 
 Life, 347 note ; Commentary 
 on the Epistle of St. John, 
 387 note. 
 
 Whitfield, George, 53. 
 
 Wilberforce, Archdeacon, The 
 Doctrine of the Incarnation, 
 136. 
 
 Wordsworth, 73 ; Ode to Duty, 
 quoted, 242. 
 
 Words of eternal life, 197. 
 
 World, The, thatis to come,293. 
 
 Young, John, The Christ of 
 History, 349 note. 
 
 Zeitgeist, 3. 
 
 Zola, Emile, 17, 223; La Bete 
 Humaine, 213. 
 
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